Weddings

Your wedding should always be the happiest day of your life, but it is no secret that they can be incredibly expensive with many costs to cover. In 2017, the average cost of a wedding in the UK rose to a staggering £27,161 which is up 10% from the previous year and the highest it has ever been.

This means that whether you are paying for the wedding yourself, contributing or you have offered to pay for your child’s wedding (an incredibly generous gesture), you may need to find a few ways to finance the day. It is important that it is a special event, so make sure that it lives up to expectation by properly financing it.

Co-Funding

Instead of bearing the brunt completely, many couples are now pooling their resources together to raise funds for their special day. This can be a great way to share the cost of a very happy day for everyone, so consider opening discussions with family and those closest to you about co-funding the wedding – many couples are also now asking their guests for contributions instead of a gift, so that they can all enjoy the day together.

Loan

Another good option is to take out a personal loan as these can be used how you wish and are an effective way to quickly get a substantial amount. If you have bad credit, consider improving your credit score before making an application to increase the chances of getting approved and also getting better rates. As always, just be sure that you can afford the repayments.

Home Equity

When it comes to home equity, one of the many ways you could spend money released from your home, is to fund your wedding. This could be so that you can buy the dress of your dreams, pay for the venue or even fund your honeymoon. You can learn more about home equity with Sunlife, for example, to find out whether this is an option for you.

Crowdfunding

It is amazing just how generous people can be, and crowdfunding is a great example of this. Crowdfunding involves asking for contributions to just about anything on an online platform, and then people from all around the world can contribute. There are some huge platforms to choose from as well as wedding specific crowdfunding websites to try.

Boost Your Savings

Finally, you can fund a wedding by boosting the amount of money you have to spend on the big day. You can boost your savings by supplementing your income, cutting back on spending and selling possessions that you do not need. Additionally, there are always ways to cut back on the cost of a wedding which you may want to consider.

Your wedding day should be the happiest day of your life, and you do not want to have to worry about money. Weddings are also incredibly expensive, but the above are a few options that you have to fund the day, whether you are paying for it yourself, contributing or a generous individual who has offered to pay for a couple.

The majority of brides to be are guilty of exactly the same thing – they spend the early days of planning faffing about over minor details. They purchase personalised eye masks and slippers for the bridesmaids, invest in guest books, choose out name cards and placeholders or table decorations for the meal… the list goes on and on. But there’s generally one main reason that they focus their attention on these relatively trivial details – they are procrastinating.

The bigger purchases are a lot more daunting to deal with. Not only in regards to their cost but also in terms of their centrality to the whole event when it arrives. It’s much easier and much less pressure to choose what wines will be available with the meal than it is to commit to a dress, fork out for a cake, or settle on a venue. If this sounds familiar to you, don’t worry. We’re all guilty of it! But there are a few things that you can do to get the big purchases organised early on. Here are some to consider!

Covering the Costs

Big purchases tend to come hand in hand with expensive price tags. Nowadays, the average dress costs £1,500. The average cake comes in at £500. The average venue will take £4,300 to secure.

So, it’s not all too surprising that we put them off. However, at the end of the day, these are all things you’re going to need to secure and pay for, so it’s a good idea to get to grips with your financial options early.

If you’re not lucky enough to have your parents making a healthy contribution to your wedding (we’re so blessed!), you’ll need to figure a way to fund your wedding.

• Your first option is to make use of savings, and if you don’t have any, start putting something away!
• If you haven’t got time for that, you come to option two: a wedding loan. Wedding loans cover the costs for you now and you can pay them back at a later date in instalments. Perfect!

Settling on a Theme

A theme is going to be central to your big day. Once you’ve got this sorted it makes it so much easier to get an idea of how much your big day is going to cost. The sooner you settle on a theme, the easier it is going to be to plan every other aspect of your event. Aesthetically, you want everything to be in line. Otherwise, you’ll end up with a mish mash of styles. Generally speaking, the most important theme of your wedding (other than love, of course) is going to be the colour scheme.

This can help you to make all sorts of decisions, from what colour the bridesmaids dresses should be to the decorative icing on your cake, what flowers will form your bouquet and other floral decorations, and even what colour sashes should lie on the back of guests’ chairs. Try to choose a colour that complements every aspect of the event, from the bride to the venue. This will ensure that everything appears flattering and melds perfectly together.

While big purchases may be daunting, they are something that you’re going to have to tackle and deal with at some point down the line. So you might as well get to grips with them sooner rather than later. This gives you more time to prepare!