Step daughter's wedding - Who pays?

BugglyB

I think you have to be clear that this is between her and her dad. Be firm with your partner on how much the two of you are willing to contribute - its your money too - but let him have the arguments with her!

RAS

coffeebee wrote: »

DH stated at the beginning what he was willing to contribute, which was met with derision and sulks despite being good sized 4 figure sum.

Advise them that dad will match DSD's personal contribution to the wedding funds, as a maximum.

I would expect her to fund it herself, but a bit of help is nice.

Indout96

BugglyB wrote: »

I think you have to be clear that this is between her and her dad. Be firm with your partner on how much the two of you are willing to contribute - its your money too - but let him have the arguments with her!

I think that depends how long she has been a stepdaughter for. I brought up our son (actually my stepson) from the age of 3, he is now 32 If anything needs sorting it is done by all of us.
However if its only a recent thing then maybe stepping back is the right think to do but remember its your money too not just your husbands.

cr1mson

What I would like to do in your situation is tell her where to get off however appreciate that is not an option!

Therefore I would offer her a choice of some money towards her wedding and she gets to pick what she spends it on or you pay for whole wedding but you set budget and pick everything!

C

Plans_all_plans

Your step daughter sounds like a spoilt nightmare! If she plans to carry on like this with her future husband then I wouldn't be holding out too much hope for the marriage!

She should be planning a wedding that THEY can afford and she should be immensely grateful to have family around her who are willing to contribute anything. In your shoes, I'd be withdrawing the offer of any help towards the wedding until she learns some gratitude.

borokat

My dad made a big contribution to my wedding - in fact he paid for the majority. The rest, my husband and I paid for. We were lucky, and really grateful. That was my dad's choice to give us the money though, so your step daughter should accept what has been offered with good grace. The budget my dad gave us - we could have had a smaller wedding and he would have therefore paid the entire bill, or we could have said lets wait another year and save up another £5k and my Dad's bit would have been proportionally less of the bill. What I'm trying to say is, if she wants certain things on the wedding day then fine, good luck to her, but she has to pay for them herself.

Plans_all_plans

Can I ask what your husband's take is on all this?

onlyroz

We paid for our own wedding. Hubby's parents gave us £2k as a wedding present, and my parents paid for the flights on our honeymoon.

Unless your husband has previously given the green-light to paying for a "lavish" wedding then he is under no obligation (moral or otherwise) to pay a penny. He has offered a generous sum, and if this is thrown back in his face then he needs to reassess the relationship he has with his daughter.

However, as step-mum it's not your place to be saying anything directly to step-daughter. Any arguments should be coming directly from your husband.

As an aside, weddings don't HAVE to cost a fortune - and surely by now step-daughter would have learned to live within her means?

chelle230

She is being completely selfish!

When we married 5 years ago, we budgeted for it all ourselves, and then family started suggesting that instead of presents, they would help contribute in other ways.
We had our cake given to us, sit down meal, evening do, etc.
Maybe suggest chipping in other ways.

It wasn't an extravagant do, we wanted small and as cheap as possible.
It wasn't about the whole wedding day, more the end result for us, but either way I certainly wouldn't have expected anyone to pay for it!

Acc72

coffeebee wrote: »

My 23 yo step daughter's having a lavish wedding - upmarket venue, vintage cars, elaborate hen night, etc. Problem is she has very little money - fiance is in modestly paid work, she is stay at home mum some days, part-time student others.

It seems from the above that your step daughter likes to pick and choose which traditions she believes in !

Is she the only child or are there other siblings - if so, did you (or do you plan to) contribute to their weddings ?

Generally speaking, these days in many cases the wedding is paid for by the couple getting married and both families may make a contribution, but the days of father of the bride paying for everything are very rare.