Just in case you don’t follow me on Instagram, Chris and I are engaged!

One of the most frequently asked questions I’ve gotten since we got engaged is: did you know or were you surprised?

The answer: both. It was a total surprise to me that it happened when it did, how it did, who knew and was involved, etc. but Chris and I had looked at rings together a few times.

When I felt like it might happen in the next year or so, I did some two big things to financially prepare.

A wedding savings account

I started a wedding savings account before I was engaged. I know, I know, this sounds crazy but what’s crazier is the average American wedding costs $34k (We’ll be way under this cost for sure). The wedding industry has boomed, making celebrating your love in a traditional wedding more expensive.

I’ve always known that I wanted a certain type of wedding and that I wasn’t willing to go into debt for it. I was also very adamant about not wanting to spend all of our extra cash flow on wedding expenses while we were engaged. I wanted this season to be a fun one where we still got to live the lives we loved, not one where we only stayed in the house eating pb&j so we could penny-pinch for a wedding. We’ll still have to make some sacrifices because there is still a budget to abide by but there won’t be nearly as many.

I front-loaded the account with any extra money I received (birthday money, Christmas, tax refunds, etc.) and then started saving a little more consistently. Since the wedding wasn’t an immediate event or need, it fell in line after a few other financial goals but it was always there. The savings account was nicknamed “wedding” so that I could be reminded of what I was working towards.

I’m even more glad I made this decision because, with COVID, so many folks are pushing their weddings back, making it harder to secure popular venues and vendors. Because of the wedding savings account, we were able to book some of the vendors we knew we wanted almost immediately.

The way I see it, there are two possible outcomes with doing this: 1. you’ll have the money saved and ready to go if/when you decide to get married. 2. You decide not to get married or go a cheaper route and you can use that money for something else.

Opened new credit cards

I know, I know, I just said this was going to be a debt-free wedding. It is. I started researching and opening new credit cards so that I could start my travel hacking journey. My hope is that we have to pay very little for our honeymoon by using a combination of flight and hotel points. I’m not a travel hacking expert but I have learned the very basics, which has helped me gain almost 200k points for flights and hotels.

Essentially, I researched the cards I was interested in (what cards had the most bang for your buck, best consistent rewards, annual fees I was willing to pay, etc.), waited until they had a great sign-up bonus, and did all of my daily spending on them. I also timed the opening of one of my cards around a time when I knew I would have multiple big purchases to make.

I treat my credit cards like debit cards so I don’t spend money I don’t have and then I pay them off every week to avoid the temptation of letting the balance get outside of what I budgeted. This helps me stay out of debt but in the rewards game. Also, I know some of you will ask, my credit score is doing great, honestly, she’s better than she’s ever been.

As I said, I’m very much a beginner at this and our first travel hacked trip got canceled (thanks, COVID) but I’m excited about the possibilities this offers.

I’m excited about this next step in our lives and I’m glad I made certain financial decisions to prepare myself for it. Let me know if you have any questions about this or if you have specific wedding planning content you’d like to see!

Stay sassy,

Steph