{"id":208,"date":"2010-05-19T11:29:05","date_gmt":"2010-05-19T11:29:05","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.myfinancialfocus.net\/mainsite\/?p=208"},"modified":"2025-08-24T06:39:14","modified_gmt":"2025-08-24T10:39:14","slug":"the-wedding-season","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.myfinancialfocus.net\/mainsite\/index.php\/the-wedding-season\/","title":{"rendered":"The Wedding Season"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>This past weekend I attended Brad and Mav&#8217;s wedding. \u00a0It was a great wedding and great food at the reception (my favorite part). \u00a0While their wedding was a beautiful thing to them, it made me begin to think of the cost today to pay for a wedding. \u00a0Being a financial coach, money is something that I think about all the time, but most of that thinking is around how to help others manage well.<\/p>\n<p>So, I am sitting in the church awaiting the service to start and numbers start going through my mind. \u00a0What did that cost? \u00a0What will this cost? \u00a0Was &#8220;it&#8221; paid with cash or will they have the opportunity to pay for it over the next fews months and even years? \u00a0Questions that any financial coach should ponder.<\/p>\n<p>As I was thinking, I was continually reminded of the approach I tell all my clients on paying for weddings &#8211; BUDGET!! \u00a0Most couples go into wedding planning with one of two things &#8211; no financial plan or a plan that is not set in its dollar amount. \u00a0Then, like with other major purchases, the plan and costs grow and grow &#8211; sometimes out of sight!<\/p>\n<p>Advice to a bride, a groom or a parent(s) of a soon to be wedded person &#8211; set a hard dollar amount and stick to it. \u00a0Spend from that amount, on paper, until you have exhausted what you have or what you want the wedding to be. \u00a0Once that is firm, then you can begin with the wedding. \u00a0Stick to the plan!<\/p>\n<p>Parents, can I offer you an even better idea? \u00a0Set a firm dollar amount and give it to your child with two conditions. \u00a0First, if they go over the amount you are setting aside it will be up to them to pay for it. \u00a0Second, if they go under that amount set, they keep the difference! \u00a0You may be surprised to see what kind of wedding is planned when there is potentially money left on the table for them to use to pay off some bills, take a nice honeymoon, save on a down payment for a house or just put into savings.<\/p>\n<p>Nice weddings are just that. \u00a0It was a great afternoon, but what is really besides the new bride and groom?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>This past weekend I attended Brad and Mav&#8217;s wedding. \u00a0It was a great wedding and great food at the reception (my favorite part). \u00a0While their wedding was a beautiful thing to them, it made me begin to think of the cost today to pay for a wedding. \u00a0Being a financial coach, money is something that [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[16,14],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-208","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-life","category-planning"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.4 - 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