What if you could do it all again?

I would say it is completely up to you and your significant other, I have heard that Toronto is crazy expensive for weddings, and If I still lived there (moved away 15 years ago), I would NOT get married there. I would say if you really want to have a wedding, maybe have a small ceremony that you can afford and do your best to stay in budget, and then have a party celebration after. In the end you I think you would appreciate using that money for buying a house. You can always go back and have a big anniversary celebration party, or re-new your vow ceremony and re-create it like the wedding of your dreams! You can also just elope!

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Thanks Amber! Good to know there are others out there!

I've been asking myself the same question, to be honest. It feels nice knowing I'm not the only one second guessing the big plans. I also live in Toronto - we want to have kids soon, and own a property someday (lol likely not anytime soon around here, but still...). We've been engaged for over a year, and we're pretty laid back people so I've been coming at this wedding planning thing pretty slowly. We're getting a lot of pressure from family to increase this and that, and my FSIL just had a big, beautiful, fancy wedding that people have asked me how I'm going to top (hint: I'm not). So I've wound up planning a pretty traditional wedding for two pretty non-traditional people. In a way, yeah there are elements of the big wedding that I've been looking forward to for a long time. But I'll be honest, I'm second guessing the big wedding and thinking about scaling down to immediate family and close friends for a more low-key thing. I still want it to be special, and feel like a celebration - I just don't want to look back and ask that same question of 'would I have done this differently'. I guess it's a lot of pressure planning this thing everyone says is the best day of your life!!

We booked a venue in my hometown, London because the Toronto wedding prices were out of control. It's beautiful, and a lot of things are included that would have cost a heck of a lot more in Toronto. Even still, I'm considering a change. It's easier said than done, knowing how upset the family would be to find out we've changed the original plans.

Either way, this is more of a solidarity response to let you know you are not alone in your thinking - wondering what the best option is for you. I'm sure we'll both figure it out soon! The main thing I try to keep in perspective is that one way or another, I'm marrying my partner and we get to build a life together. However it happens, that is pretty awesome!

These are some helpful questions to ask yourself: https://www.weddingwire.com/wedding-ideas/do-you-want-a-wedding

I think you can still have a "hoopla" wedding but on a budget. Set yourself a reasonable budget and work within it and don't look at anything even remotely outside of it. It's like when buying a house: if your budget is 400K don't look at million dollar mansions.

You could also do a small ceremony and then a casual reception and dinner that is hosted by a family member or something and is like a potluck.

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I find it difficult to justify spending 30K+ on one big party. I live in the GTA and unfortunately FH and I had to go with a banquet hall and all the hoopla, but it's still rough to know all this money is going into ONE DAY.

Do what feels right for you Caitlin. I go through phases where I'm okay with the cost, then other days where I can't believe how nuts we are spending this money.

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Girl. I feel you on this. We've been together for 13 years so thinking about waiting another 2 years for the wedding is a hard reality to face. Also, with 125 guests and not loving the whole banquet hall option, anything I like is closer to $35 - $40K. That part's obviously me just being picky, but that's the thing - trying to make it cheaper will only result in an event that's STILL super expensive AND not really my perfect day either. ugh Toronto. Why I live in you.

We live in Toronto and I ask myself this question everyday!! Neither one of our parents can help, we don't already own a home and there are things I want in life more than I want this one day.

He comes from a big Italian family so we can't do a small thing, if we don't invite all the aunts uncles and cousins some people will be extremely offended. After getting some venue prices I've realized that if I intend to get married in Toronto it will have to be a super budget event and certainly not the wedding of my dreams. Is 20-30k really worth it just to have a wedding, and not even one I'm really happy with?? The prices in Toronto are out of control!!

I could wait longer to save more but we've already been living together for 9 years, it's getting to the point where I just want to be married already. And then I'd still be sol on a downpayment. I want the big day but now I'm not sure so we're also talking about eloping or city hall or destination with limited invitees. Gotta consider all the options.

I always vouche for a small wedding.

I wouldn't change anything we've done - I loved it all, but the wedding market is just nuts.

I did want a potluck and a chill out day, which I was told no on.

However - we had already bought our house and are both in good jobs. We're fairly lucky.

We bought a house first, then got married (a little over a year later).

We had a really small wedding in a small town where our family cabin is.

It was the best choice for us. We paid for the wedding ourselves (for the most part).

We decided we would rather have money in the bank, than have an expensive wedding. Life is super expensive already, no need for us to drop $25K+ on a day.

But to each their own.

I live in the States and I choose to do a small wedding with ceremony and dinner and no reception in Canmore. I'm not a dancer and neither is he. We choose to do this to save money and spend half the budget and still get the benefit of having a great wedding. We made a VK out of it and get to spend 5 days with our nearest and dearest. The final budget is 7K and total of 24 ppl. We can use the other money to put away or what every we want plus everyone is going some where they have never been. So they are all excited to go!

Elope! LOL

I say going through the whole day is worth it. It was a small intimate wedding and just having the time with family is the most important thing.

There are some things i would cut costs around to save more. Online shopping saved tons of money and full refunds if it wasn't proper or on time arrival. Not to mention you get to keep it too for free.

I think it's easy to say you would go back and not do the big formal affair after you've already gotten to do it... but I honestly think I would regret not doing the whole thing. I know I would regret eloping or the courthouse thing. I want our families and our friends all together in one space witnessing our vows and celebrating with us.

I guess our situation is a bit different though, in that we already own a house and we are not having kids, so basically the money we would save on the wedding would either go into house reno's, retirement or something else. We are also doing a destination wedding, which will save us a bit of dough but probably not a tonne at the end of the day because if people are going that far to attend our wedding, I want to provide a top notch party and will probably end up purchasing a lot of extras

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This is the thought I keep coming back to...it's really important we don't go into any debt for our wedding so I'm thinking waiting one more year will give us the extra time to save and pay for everything without credit cards or a line of credit, but I keep coming back to the thought that after all that saving, that's a pretty good nest egg for when we have kids! haha Anyway, thanks for the response!

Me personally I have been saving money since I got a job when I was 16 - so now at age 20 (almost 21) I just moved into a house with my FH and are planning a wedding that at the end of things should only cost us about $20,000. I think that it is totally possible to have both! (At least here in MB if you are a first time home buyer you only have to put 5% down for a house.)

Budget is key though, if you aren't already I recommend making an excel spreadsheet with incoming money and outgoing money and give you and him an "allowance" of sorts

But yes, overall I wouldn't want to go completely low budget on what is supposed to be one of the happiest days of your life but at the same time don't feel the need to spend $30,000 on just the venue/food alone.

I really think it depends on the couple and their personal circumstances. IMO owning a home is way more important then a wedding day. A wedding is 8 hours, a home is a forever investment. We already own a home and have kids. Getting married is our final step lol. But I still canceled our $32,000 wedding and decided to have a small destination wedding. It’s currently at $23,000, which is at least cheaper then the original plan. But we want to build our dream home, and I would much rather my money go to that. I really think opinions and priorities tend to change as we get older. I was willing to go to the court house then take family out to a restaurant haha. He wanted more then that, which is fine. I am not someone who as dreamed of my wedding day for a long time. If I was, it would probably be a more extravagant event. If a wedding is really important to you, then you will likely never regret the amount spent to make it your truly special day.

I got the same advice from friends too...

I think it's easier for everyone to say that because they have experienced it already. Regardless if they would have done it differently and saved, you'll never know because they have the memories of their big party. If you took away those memories, they probably would still be thinking of the big party.

We are still going to do the party. Of course, we are shopping around for vendors and determining things we can make or do ourselves to help save but you only get married once (hopefully) and yes, it's ONE day but it's one of the most important days of your life.

Do what you're comfortable with. Don't get overwhelmed. Make a list of a few vendors. I found it was helpful concentrating on one thing at a time. We started with our top 2-3 vendor choices for venues for example, we booked appointments as close as possible so that the information was fresh and we could compare. If none worked out, we chose another 2. When we finally decided, we started with a different vendor - eg. photography. Remember, some vendors on weddingwire offer promotions too.

I wish you all the best on this journey,

Adele

Our families are helping out a lot. My mom also helped me to get the down payment for my duplex and my fiancé owns a condo that he rents out. So we are paying our own mortgages and the rent money goes to our wedding expenses. For us it is also a very special day as we are getting married on what would have been our daughters first birthday, I misscarried a year ago almost now. I also don’t want to regret having something that would have made my day special. We also won’t be going on a honeymoon for a year after the wedding so that will help us save. Also already living together for a year and a half we have a lot of the house hold things and so we are not having a registry, but more of a honeymoon fund or any extras we are wanting to have. So in the end I know our wedding will be a lot of fun and a night I will remember for the rest of my life.

My fiance and I are super fortunate that my parents are paying for the wedding, and even his parents are contributing... they did tell us up front that whatever we didn't spend of our budget, we could have for a down payment... but currently we are right on budget.
To me, my wedding day was something I've dreamed about since a little girl. We actually are doing it fairly simple for 100 people... not much extra decor, no "extras" that dont matter to us. But overall having that big day, the dress, reception... it was important to us.
It's a 100% personal choice, and you and your fiance should sit down and talk about what you would both truly miss if you didn't do it. You may discover all you both care about is some good food with close family and friends! or maybe you realize there are parts of a bigger wedding that you really want to have. Or a mix of both!

I regretted the amouny of money spent on my first wedding. I definitely would have preferred a house and a savings account for when I had my daughter.

So this time around we are doing very cheap and simple. It's all about the ceremony for us.

Hit reply too soon and I can’t edit! We waited an extra year to get married to have the dream wedding. It was still pretty simple, but I have lots of family and friends from another province I wanted to invite. I don’t regret it! I loved being able to celebrate with everyone!

We waited an extra year