In a continuing effort to help you all out, make use of this information however it best suits you. http://www.ozy.com/acumen/in-sickness-and-in-health-but-not-in-debt/38366?utm_source=A1&utm_medium=pp&utm_campaign=pp
(Cliffs: Expensive ring/wedding = greater likelihood of divorce)
I found this both interesting and amusing, so I thought I'd pass it along for discussion here and/or with SWMBO.
Saw that this morning on my FB feed. This is VERY pertinent to the next year of my life...fortunately SWMBO has relatively cheap tastes and parents who are well-to-do. I'm just along for the ride. 
It is my thought that the type of people who decide they need an expensive ring and an expensive wedding to be happy are the type that would be a pain in the ass to be married to, leading to divorce. The more expensive event/ring required, the bigger pain in the ass. 
I'll be married for a hundred years with her $300 ring and our $700 wedding. 
We'll still be married when the sun explodes. Her first ring was $75 and the wedding was $20.
Next anniversary will be 28.
See it all the time, before I quit working in the DJ field, the company did 3 wedding receptions for the same broad.....hell, I think Lobster was served at each.
dinger wrote: It is my thought that the type of people who decide they need an expensive ring and an expensive wedding to be happy are the type that would be a pain in the ass to be married to, leading to divorce. The more expensive event/ring required, the bigger pain in the ass.
I figure this is pretty accurate. I suppose there could be the stress of the debt at the start of your marriage as a contributing factor, too.
The cost of the wedding is directly related to the level of the maintenance of one of the parties involved.
I got lucky then. Wife and I wanted cheap, but her parents insisted on satisfying family and guests, so it became expensive quick. I didn't want to elope because I wanted to throw a party, and she didn't want to throw a party without it having a certain "hippy" vibe, as she doesn't much care for the redneck firehall style parties (which I'm fine with). Once the in-laws decided they were going to pay for everything the caterer started racking up the bill. I liked our food, but the event planner was terrible.
Her ring was cheap and made of wood.
I think we'll do alright.
Engagement ring, ~$2K, her wedding band and mine, ~$8-900 for both, wedding about $5K. For $30K, I could think of a lot more exciting things to do....like pay down the mortgage, maybe get another Mustang.
quietly raises hand
I was the expensive one when I came to the wedding 
Having an expensive wedding.
Situations are different. My wedding is going to be about $25k. However, we're also having about 250 guests, and it is in Chicagoland which is inherantly more expensive than many other places in the country. Despite that, we're just at the average wedding price for the country, IIRC, but we're also at about double the average guest list. And we really want those people there. Other than about 12 total, we both know everyone on that list pretty personally (both have big families).
If her mother wasn't involved, it would be much cheaper, but we need to tread carefully. She has MS, and this is her one big production while she is still relatively able bodied. Within a year, she probably won't be able to walk.
EDIT: There will be no debt taken on for this though.
The only expensive part of mine was the reception, and only because my M-I-L had to impress her NYC relatives. But that was covered out of my wife's share of her brothers life insurance.
Thankfully between tax returns and help from our families, we didn't take on any debt for it.
My wedding was under 1000$ all in, including the dress, the food, the venue, the rings, the tux, the works. I'll be married longer than cockroaches and twinkies. My brother dropped gigantic cash on a diamond and a wedding. His wife left the monday before thanksgiving.
First wedding was an actual traditional wedding & reception, and cost more than I wanted to know (in-laws paid for it)- I frankly didn't care about how fancy it was. Her rings weren't cheap either, but I picked out the stones myself and helped design the settings. When we split up that was probably one of the things that irked me the most- she wanted to end things but kept the ring.
Second 'wedding' was at the courthouse followed by lunch for the few friends we invited, with a 'reception' a month and a half or so later at a local restaurant we like. Total cost was less than 1/10th of what I seem to remember the reception at my 1st costing. Honeymoon likely cost less too and had a MUCH better time than I did on the first one.
9 months into my first marriage, there were VERY definite issues (hell, there were issues before the ceremony even got started...) and we were both fairly unhappy. The same 9 months in now things are infinitely better and we're both quite happy.
I paid about $2K for my wife's wedding ring/band set. My ring was about $400. Wedding cost us $100. $50 for the license and $50 for the Justice of the Peace and wedding at the courthouse. 13 great years this month. We are both very practical with our spending. Why pay so much to entertain OTHER people?
Well I got lucky, both in finding my wife, and the fact that Daddy Warbucks (Father-in-Law) footed the bill for our expensive, over the top wedding. He said it was equal to buying a new car and driving it off a cliff. I asked him not too long ago if he was getting close to paying off his house. He said, "the thing was paid for until you married my daughter." Ahh, I see.
I spent around a paychecks worth on my wife's ring. Next to nothing for my ring. Our wedding money paid for the honeymoon. Overall I say I had it pretty good.
My now wife and I aborted two separate wedding attempts because our parents kept trying to push us into too much complexity / expense.
We resolved the problem by spontaneously deciding to get married which left everyone with just a few days’ notice to show up at the location of our choosing.
ScreaminE wrote: I asked him not too long ago if he was getting close to paying off his house. He said, "the thing was paid for until you married my daughter." Ahh, I see.
Yea, it delayed my in-laws buying a place in Florida by a few years.
When I got married it was expensive (for us) but I had the impression we were both in it for the long haul and that it was only a one time expense.
Six months in the giant flashing warning signs were there that it wasn't what I had signed up for and that I should get out....but I wasn't done paying for it yet (one year of credit card debt). I'm no quitter so I decided to make it work which only kicked the divorce can down the road a decade and led to a much more expensive experience. Rather than taking my $2000 lump then I was stubborn and it's cost 150X as much.
If SWMBO and I decide to go down the marriage road it will be for $100. Berkeley expensive weddings!
Toyman01 wrote: We'll still be married when the sun explodes. Her first ring was $75 and the wedding was $20.
Bwahaha winnar!
You can start a magazine called Grassroots Weddingsports (wait...that sounds quite "adult" )
100 for rings, whatever her dress cost and whatever my in laws spent for the chairs and archway rental. I'll be married forever.
Whenever a friend of mine gets engaged, I tell them that with 12 hours notice, I can meet them at the Vegas airport with the '66 Cadillac and I'll drive them to get married by Elvis. They laugh at first, but you can see them start to think about it as The Wedding Industry gets the hooks in.
Our wedding was a backyard affair with 25 people - immediate family and about two friends. The ceremony was performed by a friend, there was a brisket in the smoker and it was the best smelling ceremony ever. Plus we have our "wedding tree" in our yard The only thing we splurged on was a pro photographer, and it was well worth it. No drama, lots of smiles, very relaxing.
My sister in law picked a guy with a high maintenance mother. He's a bit high maintenance as well. The wedding was a roving all-day affair with two ceremonies (the one his mother wanted and the one the bride wanted), panics over catering problems at the remote resort in the mountains above Vail, transportation difficulties due to the location of the aforementioned resort, etc. I hate to think what it cost. There was more stress in the day due to the complexity of it all. The photos were taken by a friend of the groom and they're pretty poor despite the backdrop.
Funny part is that my Father in Law said that he would give us $10k to elope. I was dead serious and said absolutely. My Mother in Law wanted to have the extravagant party. Guess who won.
When SWIMBO was finally coerced into being Mrs. etifosi, it was an extravagantly expensive and complex event. IMSA had to be called in to sanction it and racing teams from around the world gathered together to toast our nuptials with racing fuel. There were 10's of thousands of people present, I'm pretty sure some of you were even there!
We were wed at Lime Rock Park, at the start/finish line right before the ALMS Northeast Grand Prix on July 7, 2007.
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