I have a friend who has four children, one of whom is marrying in an Asian country shortly, with another to follow (a trans son) and quite likely another in a year or so. The youngest doesn’t have any plans on the horizon.
My friend has always tried to treat her children equally when it comes to gifting. Her ex has taken to playing financial games, not only during the divorce–let’s just say that she found out he had spent $60K on “sex workers” in the last few years of the marriage–during which he of course minimized and hid income, but since then on various graduation dinners. His income is significantly higher than hers, but he continually pressures her to pay half for luncheons and dinners that include more people from “his” side than hers, and often selects very expensive venues or drives up the bill by means such as ordering several very expensive bottles of wine, encouraging everyone to order extra courses, etc. Most recently he told his D that he would contribute $25 per person towards her grad lunch, then drove up the bill as much as possible, leaving my friend to either pony up more than he was contributing on the spot or leave it for her D to pay for her own graduation lunch.
Anyway, she declared to me that she was done pretending to be a family and would no longer participate in these events. She’ll take her kids out herself. She is worrying about the upcoming weddings, especially the potential wedding of her D. I suggested to her that she decide on a figure that she can gift each of her kids, to be used for the wedding, a down payment, or whatever they wished. She asked me what people were giving these days. I told her it depended on the parent’s resources, but that I had the impression that it ranged from a couple thousand to $30K for families who are upper middle class and don’t have other outstanding obligations.
Although her ex probably makes at least twice what she does, she is a physician and has a good income also.
Obviously, she should never offer to pay for the meal and drinks. It should be a fixed menu, with one drink per person (from a wine or beer drink), like they do at the psychomedicatication meetings. Any guests who have tried to overrule that stipulation should not be invited to any future events. This is what the pharmacy reps do; you try to offer off menu, you are not invited to future meetings.
So sad, but so often an occurrence. Set limits and follow through.
We have a son and daughter. Our plan is to give each of them the same lump sum for weddings if that ever happens.
We will give them the money up front. If they can add to it, or their future in laws add to it, that will increase their budget for the wedding. That is the budget they will need to use to plan…so if they want more guests, they will need to figure out a less expensive venue/meal/liquor or whatever.
Really…the budget will be driving the wedding decisions.
If they decide to get married at city hall and have a family dinner…they can take our contribution…and do whatever they choose to do with it.
We also have a S and D. We will also likely gift each an equal amount at some point, that they can spend in a wedding or down payment for a place to live, or whatever. At this point, neither is in a relationship, but we expect it may happen someday.
@Consolation - In that awful circumstance, agree she should set a dollar amount and give it to the couple to handle their own wedding. And separate the cost of the wedding form the wedding gift $. Between the $ wedding gift (the amount of which changed), the value of the stones we gave to DS for his wife, and the things we paid for (flowers, all Fri night food/beverage and transportation) and a few days of the honeymoon (though we were able to gift hotel points) it still climbed to much more than we had anticipated spending. So tell her to be careful. Good luck!
@Consolation - I agree about advising your friend to offer a set amount to each child. Since there are 3 marrying in the next year or so, that should be easy to plan for. Advise her to advise her children to avoid situations where their obnoxious Dad can take over and try to ruin things. For example, don’t have the rehearsal dinner at a restaurant where people can order off the menu. Even if you have a set menu and set drink limit, prepare the restaurant staff to be very firm and not allow anyone to order additional items unless they produce a credit card to cover it. Same for invitations. Don’t give him any. Let the marrying couple send them out directly to people he’s allowed to invite. Maybe he shouldn’t even know the specific details until it’s too late for him to interfere. Tell him the date and the city and that “you’re working on the rest”.
I don’t know if we are living the same life or not but I don’t think you can impress young people with a 4-figure wedding lump sum. They will thank you of course but it would take more to impress them.
I’m not looking to impress my kids with a sum of money I cannot afford so they can have the wedding of their dreams.
My S is getting married in 2017. We haven’t decided what our contribution will be yet. The kids have assured us that they have saved enough for the wedding they want plus enough for a sizable down payment on a house.
We (and S’s fiancées parents) have given them the gift of a debt free education.
I think that my H and I deserve to have the retirement we planned. I guess it gets to me that here and IRL that it seems to be expected to completely fund a education, expensive trips and a wedding of their dreams and whatever else our kids desire. To sacrifice our future for outside impressions of wealth to others.
I know that there are many who can afford to fund things that we can’t. But I’m tired of pretending that we can afford everything without working the rest of our lives. My H has a co worker who has a D getting married a month before our S. H said that co worker is paying for the wedding and he expects not to retire anytime soon. He is 61 years old. Maybe he wants to work forever. I don’t know.
@Consolation, I agreee with @jym626 , I would recommend coming up with a reasonable budget and give the majority of it as a cash gift to give the couple for planning pirposes and reserve the remainder for surprise contributions. I would probably think of reserving 25-30%. None of my kids has a wedding on the horizon but they are of that age and so my husband and I are talking about it. We still have one to put through college so that is our priority. But I would like to be able to help with a very generous gift if we can.
@deb922, I understand your frustration. The gift of a debt-free education is a considerably generous one, and your son and his fiancee can afford their own wedding and a down payment for a home - probably in no small part because he doesn’t have educational loans to repay. That’s wonderful!
But I don’t think there’s a need to pretend that you can afford everything, nor is there an obligation to sacrifice your future to impress anyone else (the kids or interested onlookers). There may be pressure in some circles to do so, just as there’s pressure in some circles to drive a certain kind of car or wear (or not wear) a certain kind of jewelry. Thankfully, our spending decisions are our own. Don’t sacrifice your future “for outside impressions of wealth to others.” No one has to do that.
Some people can afford to give their children the gifts you mention without financial strain. Some want to do that and are willing to work longer to do so. They get to choose.
I have a S and a D. I haven’t really thought about “equalizing” or even what sum might be appropriate. Cross that bridge when I come to it. We have a small family and my kids have small circles of friends so I would imagine their tastes would lean more towards small and elegant versus lavish and large. (NTTAWWT. My own wedding fell into lavish and large.). It just doesn’t seem anything anyone has ever “dreamed” of or built into a big deal.
Sorry for using “impressing” term. A few posters mentioned how grateful their kids were when presented with a lump sum. Just got me curious what that may be. I am sure they will be thankful for any amount of money but to bring out heart felt gratitude (complete with tears )may take a bit more.
It’s your choice to pretend or not to, isn’t it? Personally, I wouldn’t. Not because I am wholesome but because I am sure I’d forget what I was trying to pretend. Not good at multitasking.
The total amount I will be able to help my daughter will be on the low end of 4 figures, and I assume and expect that she will be gracious, appreciative, and effusive in her thanks – as she is and always has been about everything I have ever given her, large or small.
I can’t imagine having offspring who have some sort of set gimme standard as to what they demand from their parents.
This is such an incredibly complicated topic. Even if we limit the discussion to “upper middle class” some families will think expensive weddings are “worth it” and some will think expensive weddings a waste of money. Both points of view are valid. Huge problems can arise when parents of the couple have opposite views on this topic. It is fine to say to give the kids a lump sum. But some parents I know haven’t wanted to fund an expensive wedding, even if they could afford it. They may want to do something different for the kids with their money, assuming they are willing to spend the money on the kids. I love that some people want to host fantastic, amazing, expensive weddings - but I don’t like the wedding industrial complex is pushing them as a norm. This is a really new idea.
When I know what weddings have cost, among my family and close friends, when hosted at some sort of city venue, $30,000 was not enough budget for the expectations of the venue. It is very expensive to use a venue that requires you use their kitchen and vendors.
It is possible to have a beautiful wedding for a pretty large guest list for much much much less, if you can do all the sourcing yourself. Most people have neither the time nor energy.
Most people I know have started with a $20,000 figure. None of them stuck to that. I am putting figures in because of Consolation’s question. $20,000 is a huge amount of money.
all, that is helpful, giving rough amount. Wedding is a huge event with many guests. With that kind of number, the cost is going to run up. I am not sayning you couldn’t have a absolutely fabulous wedding with a 4 figure. Just that if you are talking 2-300 guests, it will be hard to do with a 4-figure. I think it is easy to run up the number of guests, too. 100 guests is really 50 couples that includes close relatives, siblings, uncles, aunts from both mom’s and dad’s family.
I’m pretty sure if I gave my younger son $9000 for a wedding (a measly four figures!) he’d be gobsmacked. But he’s a cheapskate. I think you should give what you can afford and don’t feel guilty for one second. If you gave them the gift of a free education you’ve already done more than most parents have. I think shows like “Say yes to the dress” have given people wildly inappropriate ideas for what a wedding needs to be. There is no one right size or one right level of fanciness, but no one should be jeopardizing their future by having the wedding of their dreams.
I think it’s really surprising how the little things add up, we told me DD & her F-DH that we would give them X amount and they could elope and keep it, spend it however they liked, etc. Then she chose a wedding at our home & there were some costs we paid up front on her behalf, it was like going to Costco when you don’t spend more than $30 on one thing, but you just spent $500 and still don’t have dinner, there were just so many little things that added to the total.
Someone mentioned what to do if siblings don’t get married. I think we will wait and if they hit 35 unmarried, we will gift them the “wedding” amount and think of it as more “Happy Adulthood” than Happy Wedding.
)may take a bit more.