Planning a wedding should be a fun thing that a couple can do together and enjoy. It’s all about making the day as special as possible and ensuring that you have lots of happy memories to keep with you for the rest of your lives.
However, although this is what it should be like, the reality is that wedding planning can sometimes be stressful, and a lot of the time, that’s down to money. Not knowing your budget and trying to guess how much you can spend, only to find you’ve booked too many things or spent too much is upsetting, and it isn’t the fun experience you would have wanted.
This is why you must organize your wedding budget first before you do anything else. With that in mind, here are some ways to do it.
Take A Cash Inventory
The first step in your wedding budget is to determine how much cash you actually have to spend before taking any borrowing into account. In other words, what ‘spare’ money do you have?
Start with your monthly income. How much is left over after all the essentials are paid for? All of this can be put into a separate wedding savings account because otherwise, you might be tempted to spend it. No matter how big or how small the amount is, you should put it away safely, as it will all come together to help you purchase what you need for your wedding. The earlier you start this, the better, because of course, this means you can save up more money. You’ll also know how much borrowing you might have to do if it’s necessary.
What’s Most Important?
The next step, once you know approximately how much money you’re going to have to spend, is to look at the things that are most important to you as a couple. These are the non-negotiable items, such as your venue with all the wedding facilities you might need, the clothes for the bride and groom and the rest of the wedding party, and food. It really depends on you as to what the important elements are, so make a list and order it in terms of priority.
These are the things you cannot go without, so once you know how much these will cost, you’ll know how much money you have left over for the non-essential elements that you would still like if you can afford them.
Save Money
You are putting all your spare money aside, and you know roughly how much things are going to cost. Do the two things match up? Even if they do, putting aside even more money will help you just in case prices rise or there is some unexpected cost to deal with. It’s best to have a contingency fund of around ten to fifteen percent of your wedding budget to make sure you don’t have any problems.
Where can you get this extra money from? Look at all your monthly outgoings and see what you could cut out, even if it’s only until the wedding. Gym memberships and TV channel subscriptions are two big costs that you could save on, for example. Put any money saved into that same wedding account, so you don’t accidentally use it, and then, once the wedding is over, you can always start paying for these things again. It might be, however, that you realize you can manage fine without them.
