Lolu's Mortgage Free odyssey

South_coast

Er, your parents do know it's you that's getting married don't they 🤔🤷‍♀️??? Hope you manage to find a balance that you're happy with, and good luck with your plans x

savingholmes

Hi Lolu 

You are on a money saving site - so I will give my two penneth worth from that perspective. 

In your shoes I would 100% not add £38K of debt to your existing load. It makes no sense. You don't need an expensive honeymoon. You don't need a honeymoon that puts you into debt full stop. Personally I would trim the wedding budget significantly. People who are not financially contributing to the wedding don't get to make decisions that inflate the price either. 

It's your life, your choice. But saddling yourself with that amount of extra debt when you've worked so hard to get debt free doesn't seem logical to me. 

I wish you all the best for the future whichever option you choose. But you are posting on this site for a reason... 

misslolu

  @South_coast @savingholmes I hear what you're saying. Honestly, it's a cultural thing that we can't avoid. Mind you the costs are definitely more "weddings are expensive" than "parents are asking for too much". Eg rough cost for food alone for my preferred number of guests (150) is £7k, that's £45 a head for all courses then about £2-3k for all drinks alcoholic & non-alcoholic. Venues start from £4k for even the cheapest venues on a Saturday. That's a starting point of £13k, then you need to consider outfits, transport, hotels, music, decor, photo & video, other wedding activities etc I just don't see how to make it less than that at this time.

The honeymoon is honestly a wild guess, OH has never really travelled before so i'm planning to make it a huge multi stop trip where we can make lots of memories. We don't have a whole lot of time since we're planning on kids soon and honestly, I think it's worth it considering our plans for the future but i'll definitely look to reduce the budget and get the most bang for my buck.

It's hard to balance these things, but I do think there needs to be a balance. I can be frugal to the point of cheap, but even I feel like wedding/honeymoon should be an exception to that. Hopefully, I can get the lowest prices possible & come in under budget.

misslolu

I'm going to be more regular as I found that writing down debt updates really helps with motivation. Also, OH gets paid for some of his work weekly and some monthly so we definitely do see regular reductions to the debt. We've had some nice reductions due to surveys and a bonus from work, this is what we're looking like.

CC1 (Mine) - 1462.19 1390
CC2 (Ours) - 4007.62
CC3 (His) - 4471 4271
Medical Loan (Mine) - 1948
Student Loan - 8464.33 8067
Mortgage - 186093

Total Non - Mortgage Debt - 20,354 19,684
Total Debt - 206,446 205,777

S&S LISA - 7423
Premium Bonds - 7450
Joint Savings - 2696.42 2896

Assets - 17769

That's about £670 off the debt & £200 in savings this week and a £870 improvement in our net worth which is lovely to see! Next week won't be so exciting but i'm hoping to get a decent survey payment which help. Next week is a super important week, so i'll need all your positive vibes & prayers that it works out smoothly as it could have a huuuge effect on our future.

savingholmes

Definitely send you positive vibes.

LadyWithAPlan

How exciting congrats on all your progress 

Well done on stopping the cc for monthly - it really can become an issue rolling expenses each month 

Also my 2 pennies worth - feel free to ignore - but as a fellow frugal person with finance goals and also having ‘lived’ with  people where it has gone then awry and untangling finances was not easy and expensive! 

I would personally not be sharing finances and debt til you are married - have a joint pot for household bills and wedding saving yes but see Wattys thread for what can happen. 

Good you are on the same page to reduce debt together  - and I am with saving Holmes on the wedding cost - I have friends who just decided to go very lean on the wedding guest list size - so having to tell cousins (and friends like me  they can’t come - I get it - everything costs more from food to venues 
One of the couple is Indian so they got huge pressure on this as it’s cultural to have a huge wedding BUT it’s their life and their money which can instead go to a bigger house, the baby etc 
They are actually well off but it’s about choices. 

Also weddings in India cost a lot less as in the cost of food, labour is much less than the UK  so this old tradition has become even more expensive over the centuries. 

You could I suppose have a scorched earth life to save for the wedding - take on extra jobs, limit life spending now  but please please dont take on a huge debt for it and the honeymoon - that will put huge pressure on both of you and it’s not good for anyone’s  mental health.

Maybe ask  for donations to the honeymoon as cash gifts - I had one friend do that so they could have a brilliant honeymoon they weren’t paying for a year after they came home. 

misslolu

LadyWithAPlan said:

How exciting congrats on all your progress 

Well done on stopping the cc for monthly - it really can become an issue rolling expenses each month 

Also my 2 pennies worth - feel free to ignore - but as a fellow frugal person with finance goals and also having ‘lived’ with  people where it has gone then awry and untangling finances was not easy and expensive! 

I would personally not be sharing finances and debt til you are married - have a joint pot for household bills and wedding saving yes but see Wattys thread for what can happen. 

Good you are on the same page to reduce debt together  - and I am with saving Holmes on the wedding cost - I have friends who just decided to go very lean on the wedding guest list size - so having to tell cousins (and friends like me  they can’t come - I get it - everything costs more from food to venues 
One of the couple is Indian so they got huge pressure on this as it’s cultural to have a huge wedding BUT it’s their life and their money which can instead go to a bigger house, the baby etc 
They are actually well off but it’s about choices. 

Also weddings in India cost a lot less as in the cost of food, labour is much less than the UK  so this old tradition has become even more expensive over the centuries. 

You could I suppose have a scorched earth life to save for the wedding - take on extra jobs, limit life spending now  but please please dont take on a huge debt for it and the honeymoon - that will put huge pressure on both of you and it’s not good for anyone’s  mental health.

Maybe ask  for donations to the honeymoon as cash gifts - I had one friend do that so they could have a brilliant honeymoon they weren’t paying for a year after they came home. 

Interesting point on the joint finances, I say they're "joint" but in reality, we have separate and joint accounts where we retain ownership of our salary & CC accounts and transfer to our bill and savings accounts when necessary. Is that what you mean?

I'm from a LCOL country that has customs similar to Asia so I understand the concept of huge multi-day weddings. A wedding according to our traditions in the UK would cost upwards of £60k and accommodate 300+ guests. If I were doing it in my country the guest list would be more like 800+ and i'd be doing 3 days+ of events so i'm already compromising a lot at this point. I just genuinely don't see the point in getting married and inviting 30 people (unless its just a civil ceremony). I accept that this may be a cultural difference but for my wedding & reception I want to celebrate with my family and friends and i'd actually be upset if my cousins didn't invite me to their wedding 

Something to keep in mind is that there definitely will be family help from both sides, my bone of contention is I don't know how much at the moment, especially relative to the overall costs. We'll definitely be ushering people towards cash gifts as that's also another way to reduce costs. Another thing to consider is that OH is underemployed at the moment after just finishing his masters and is looking for jobs that are better paid (and less stressful for him). If he can get a job that pays even £5k more that's an extra £200 a month to go towards debt/saving, he's currently looking for jobs that will pay £20k more so watch this space. 

LadyWithAPlan

I am sure you will make the right decision for your life Maybe have a conversation about what family help you are getting will keep stress and anxiety  levels down and help make wedding budget decisions easier.   

I remember a Dave Ramsey call when the couple had spent $100k on their wedding  - put on their cc - and the day they returned from their honeymoon the husband lost his job....

I gather my friends cousins were a bit upset but  they also knew lots of people includong v good friends were also not being invited so it wasn't a personal exclusion - ultimately its what they decided worked for them. I am sure you will balance customs v what you want vs budget and next life goals to work for you.

Hope your OH gets a better job soon

killerpeaty

Hi lolu! You've been a busy bunny. I get it, a friend of mine had a wedding in her ancestral country with 800+ people, she's trying to get her attendees down below 400 for her UK wedding. Whereas the biggest wedding I've been to was like 100. You gotta do what's right for you.

I think the venue is probably the hardest thing with large weddings, so many just don't do it. Things my friends have done to save on wedding decor is to get things second hand, marketplace regularly has beautiful decorations which might help you.

misslolu

LadyWithAPlan said:

I am sure you will make the right decision for your life Maybe have a conversation about what family help you are getting will keep stress and anxiety  levels down and help make wedding budget decisions easier.   

I remember a Dave Ramsey call when the couple had spent $100k on their wedding  - put on their cc - and the day they returned from their honeymoon the husband lost his job....

I gather my friends cousins were a bit upset but  they also knew lots of people includong v good friends were also not being invited so it wasn't a personal exclusion - ultimately its what they decided worked for them. I am sure you will balance customs v what you want vs budget and next life goals to work for you.

Hope your OH gets a better job soon

I usually find myself making the wrong decisions haha but i'm glad you have that faith in me. This week I have my 2 final viewings for venues I like, one is cheaper than the other by about £1500, if I can swing the cheaper one i'll be ecstatic and will book as soon as I've spoken and agreed on the date with OH. We'll also have a big discussion with parents about final numbers for the guestlist, costs & their contributions. Luckily the venues take a range of numbers (100-850) we just need to decide which room we want to use so we're not locked into numbers too early. I really can't wait for this part to be over because it's been super time consuming & stressful. Once that's done we move over to fun things like food & cake tasting etc

killerpeaty said:

Hi lolu! You've been a busy bunny. I get it, a friend of mine had a wedding in her ancestral country with 800+ people, she's trying to get her attendees down below 400 for her UK wedding. Whereas the biggest wedding I've been to was like 100. You gotta do what's right for you.

I think the venue is probably the hardest thing with large weddings, so many just don't do it. Things my friends have done to save on wedding decor is to get things second hand, marketplace regularly has beautiful decorations which might help you.

I know how your friend feels, it's very tough balancing costs with wants and it's very possible to cause rifts on both sides of the family when it comes to these things which we both want to avoid. Funny enough I reckon i'm the simplest ever bride. I'm not fussed about decorations, and i'll be going with the minimal to make the room look good, i'm not opposed to DIY if that's what it takes.

In other news, i've been trying for ages to get a test and only managed to get one for March next year, I was actually lamenting to my instructor about how we'd have to reduce our lessons because it simple makes no sense to have a lesson every week for a test so far out. As luck would have it i've found one for early December which is just after when my instructor thought I could be ready to pass my test so i'm going to be working very hard to get that done and dusted. I've been the victim of our not so great bus system & unending train strikes just a little too much over the past few months and i'm really eager to get that gone. Cars will add a significant cost to the household though so it's something we need to keep in mind!