How much should the parents help?

Gman77

My fiancé and I are planning to get married next year and are starting to plan the big day. We are hoping to have a wedding out in France. There are many reasons for this but most of all it would be our dream. We are estimating a cost of between £15-20K. I have paid £5K for the engagement ring, I'm probably looking at the same again for the honey moon and we are have planned to put £5K into the wedding. My fiancés parents are divorced and they have offered us £5K each, this is obviously going to be a great help.

I wanted to know peoples opinion on what my parents should put in or what the norm is. We both come from fairly affluent families. My fiancé has 3 siblings and I am an only child.

I have hinted that we would be very grateful if my parents wanted to help us out in any way. My father wants to know how much we want. I feel awkward about asking flat out and have done no research on this matter so just wanted to know what people thought.

Tondella

The norm is there is no norm. It depends on what your parents want to spend, if indeed anything at all. Many still see it as the duty of the bride's parents, others now expect the young couple to pay for it all.

Rather than come up with an abstract amount why not ask your family to pay for something in particular - e.g. food, drinks, flowers? Then they have an idea of where their money is going? If you look on any of the wedding websites there will be a list of what the groom's family "traditionally" contributed as a starting point.

rchddap1

Personally I don't think there is a norm. Depends on the people and the situation.

My partner has 2 daughters and his opinion is when they get married it will be their affair entirely. If they're adult enough to get married, then should do the financing themselves. Bear in mind that one of the daughters is nearly 17, engaged and is planning a honeymoon, wedding, and house.

So this view may be a way to ensure that she keeps her feet on the ground and is sensible about things. And of course what is done for one child will be the same for the other when the time comes.

I am not yet married, but when we get around to it I wouldn't expect my parents to stump up anything.

Alleycat

If your parents are really keen to help out financially with your wedding and you feel uncomfortable giving them a figure (I know I would!), how about asking them to contribute to a specific part of the wedding. Maybe the flowers or the suit hire for you, your dad, best man etc?

I personally don't think that there should be an expected contribution of anything, but as they have offered it would be nice for them to know that they are paying for something tangible. There isn't really a norm I don't think as most couples these days tend to pay for the wedding themselves. I don't agree with hinting that you would like a contribution as it is your day not theirs but obviously that has been done now. I have to say though that I hate discussing money with my parents and would feel realy uncomfortable. I know I did when my mum offered to pay for the cake for my daughter's naming ceremony and I had to tell her how much it was even though it wasn't very expensive at all!

Rachie_B

lol i was about to say norm ?! there is no norm lol

its not like years ago where the brides parents pay for all or most of it

when we set the date we sat down with both sets of parents & they said they were prepared to go thirds with us which was a fabulous help

we had the day of our dreams but as we set the date 2 yrs in advance we had plenty of time to shop around etc and so in the end the wedding (minus honeymoon etc ) was about 9k so both sets of parents chipped in 3k each

you say you will put 5k as will both OHss parents well thats your 15k already

you really need to sit down and make a rough budget ie how much you are prepared to spend on xyz
(but it would appear that with a 5k engagement ring your OH isnt gonna be happy with any old dress / day ????!!! or maybe its you with the expensive tastes ? )

only you know whats most important to you ie outfits / food / venue / photography / honeymoon etc

maybe spend less on other areas of the wedding so you have more to play with on the really important ( to you ) stuff ?

calleyw

Why not ask them to pay for X and Y.

But keep in mind they may only want to spend limited amount. So expecting £5k out them to pay for your dream wedding seems a little presumptuous to me.

And if a child of mine came to me and said well I want £5K to pay for my wedding. Then they would come away empty handed.

But if they said they where paying for X and Y and need a little help with paying A and B and the cost was C. I would say ok lets have look.

Mind I rather gob smacked that any one would that payment that amount for ring and wedding. But each to their own.

Good luck and all the best with your future lives together.


Yours


Calley

BernadetteN

As someone who had a lovely wedding which cost less than £500 and an extravagent further £500 on a dress, all self-funded, I am astounded just at the cost of your engagement ring! I don't even own an engagement ring so I suppose I'm a bit biased - what matters is we've been married for a long time and have 4 lovely children, not how much a big thing one single day was.

I don't think that because the parents are affluent should make a whole lot of difference when considering asking them to pay for something as it's your choice to spend so much and they shouldn't have to contribute so much in relation to the cost. In the parents' situation, I'd probably pay for the flowers or the photos or something similar up to around a £500 maximum.

gingercordial

There is no "should", sorry! They are under no obligation to pay for anything unless they want to.

Be_Happy

Our son gets married later this year and fiancee has been quite possessive about her family paying for the wedding. However we've solved this by offering to help them with the deposit for the house they will be buying. My mother is paying for the flowers and my sister is paying for the wedding cake.

Thriftylady

I have to admit that my father paid for my wedding. He's a traditional type, and he had paid for my three older sisters weddings (although they are a fair bit older than me, and even in between their weddings and mine, the tide had shifted hugely towards the couple paying for the wedding themselves) and was adamant that he would do the same for me. Which is just as well, because we were very young, in very poorly paid jobs and couldn't have paid for it anyway. But we had a small wedding anyway, simply because that was the way we wanted it. In fact, I kept finding that my dad was saying 'are you sure about this? would you not like a few more guests?' and I was the one who was saying 'no thanks!'.