Budget Revisions Part 3

Since we've reached the 18-month mark, it's time to check our budget plan once again to see if we could still afford this wedding. Haha. Okay, the bad news is.... our expenses have now reached about P400,000. The good news is.... we have already booked all the suppliers that would eat a big chunk of our budget. So more or less, our budget would stay within this range. In case of any increase, it would probably be just minimal, about P2,000 to P5,000 at most.

Why the sudden budget increase? Well, due to the problem over the original venue of choice, I had to book another venue that costs around P10,000 more than the previous one. Then we decided to book a caterer that is really over our set budget, but is actually more sulit because of the numerous freebies that it offers. And since we got a full band for the reception, I had to upgrade my lights and sounds to a full band setup.

Here's the breakdown again of our revised budget. I've rounded off some of the figures just to give you a general idea on how much we would spend for each item, but most of the actual expenses are lower than the listed figures below.

• Church - P25,000
• Reception Venue - P25,000
• Photo - P35,000
• Video - P35,000
• Caterer - P130,000
• OTD Coordinator - P15,000
• Wedding Attire - P30,000
• Hair and Makeup - P14,000
• Hotel for Preps - P15,000
• Hotel for Wedding Night - FREE
• Wedding Rings -FREE
• Stationery - P4,000
• Flowers - P5,000
• Souvenirs - FREE
• Entertainment - P30,000
• Lights and Sounds - P15,000
• Alcohol - P5,000
• Wedding Cake - FREE
• Dessert Bar - FREE
• Bridal Car - FREE
• LCD Projector and Screen - P2,000
• Prenup Pictorial with NYO Images - P5,000
• Prenup Pictorial with Osep&Mimi - P10,000
• Miscellaneous Fees - P25,000

GRAND TOTAL: P425,000

The grand total listed here is actually the bloated amount because I added extra to some items for contingency purposes. Our actual total is considerably less than this. Hay, buti naman. Ang hirap magbudget and mag-ipon ng pera noh!

Anyway, you might notice that some of the items here are listed as FREE. This is because these items are the freebies included in our caterer's package. Oh diba, sulit talaga ang package nila. There are other items that are not included in our budget, such as our wedding rings, which will be paid solely by Mox as his gift to me, and my boudoir pictorial, which is my gift to Mox.

Even though we have increased our budget, I'm still mighty proud that we were still able to afford some of our nice-to-haves, and yet would still have enough savings to start our life together. May naitulong rin pala ang paggamit ng maraming tables sa Excel. Haha!

Our revised budget tracker

Budget Revisions Part 2

Our wedding is still 1 year and 9 months away, and yet I have already made some significant progress in our wedding plans. So after booking some of our major suppliers, I checked our budget plan to see whether we're still within our projected budget. Lo and behold, I had to do some revisions in our wedding budget once again. And no, I couldn't cut down on our costs this time; instead I had to increase our budget to accommodate additional expenses. Oh no!

First, I had to increase our budget for our church because we decided to book an airconditioned church instead of our original choice. Then we decided to book a nicer hotel for our wedding preps and add an extra night for after the wedding. I also included the expenses for both our prenup with Osep&Mimi and the free prenup that we've won from Aisle 1401's promo.

Here is the the total breakdown of our revised projected wedding budget:

• Church - P20,000
• Reception Venue - P15,000
• Photo - P35,000
• Video - P35,000
• Caterer - P90,000
• OTD Coordinator - P15,000
• Wedding Attire - P25,000
• Hair and Makeup - P14,000
• Hotel for Preps - P15,000
• Wedding Rings - P7,000
• Stationery - P5,000
• Flowers - FREE
• Souvenirs - P7,000
• Entertainment - P25,000
• Lights and Sounds - P8,000
• Alcohol - P5,000
• Dessert Bar - P4,000
• Bridal Car - FREE
• LCD Projector and Screen - FREE
• Prenup Pictorial with NYO Images - P5,000
• Prenup Pictorial with Osep&Mimi - P15,000
• Miscellaneous Fees - P25,000

GRAND TOTAL: P370,000

I didn't include our flowers, bridal car and LCD projector and screen to our wedding budget. That's because we plan to use my blue Vios for our bridal car, while Mox has his own LCD projector and screen that we can use in the reception. These alone will save us at least P8,000! As for the flowers, I plan to make fabric flowers for all our entourage's corsages and even my bridal bouquet. The materials needed for the DIYs will be charged to my personal credit card account so that wouldn't be counted in our budget. Hehe.

We also didn't include our honeymoon into the budget plan because right now, I'm crossing my fingers that someone would shoulder our honeymoon expenses as a wedding gift. Haha! But seriously, the honeymoon is not an immediate matter as for now. We could always postpone it until we have enough savings to plan the trip.

I don't know if I'm still considered a budgeted bride considering that our projected budget is almost P400,000. All I can say is at least we have booked a photographer, videographer, OTD coordinator and HMUA that is still within our set budget. I just hope we would be able to keep up with this good fortune while we're booking the rest of our suppliers, and that our budget would not go beyond the P400,000 mark.

It's a must to stick to our wedding budget!

Budget Revisions

During our early days of planning, I drafted a sample budget for our wedding totaling P350,000 for 150 guests. For some, this may seem a lot of money to spend on a wedding, but this amount is actually just the average of  how much weddings cost nowadays. Ang mahal diba? But our budget already includes funds for miscellaneous fees, a full band, a mobile bar and a dessert bar, so I guess sulit na rin siya kahit papaano.

But along the way, we've encountered some financial setbacks so I had to make adjustments in our wedding budget. We've tried to cut down our guest list to 100 people, but since Mox have a large family, we decided to keep our guest list to 150 and just look for more affordable suppliers that would fit our budget. I had to let go of some of our non-negotiables (like our videographer and a mobile bar) and just search for cheaper alternatives. I also tried to take advantages of the price lock, which luckily, some of my chosen suppliers are already offering. Plus, I plan to have some DIYs like our entourage's bouquets and our invitations just to cut down our wedding expenses.

After much deliberation, we finally came up with a revised budget plan. Our grand total came to P330,000 for 150 guests. This includes our emergency fund and budget for a full band and a dessert bar. Of course, this is just P20,000 less than our original budget, but at least we would have enough savings after the wedding even if we still have some of our nice-to-haves. After all, this is a once-in-a-lifetime event so it is all right to indulge a little. Just make sure not to overdo it. :)

It is very easy to get caught up with the wedding planning that our budget may increase or decrease at times to include our non-negotiables and nice-to-haves, but now that we've started booking suppliers, it is very important to stick to our budget plan. Since we are simultaneously saving up for the wedding while paying the suppliers, I made a table to help us keep track of our wedding expenses just to make sure we do not exceed our set budget.

Planning a wedding when you have a limited budget is hard to do, but this gives us practice for a much bigger challenge: planning for our life ahead. :)

The Cheapskate's Wedding Budget

I am the ultimate kuripot. Ask my closest friends, and they will definitely attest to that. I usually shy away from buying branded clothes, shoes and bags. In fact, Divisoria is my go-to place for my clothing needs. It came to a point that I would sacrifice good quality just for the sake of saving a few hundred pesos. Case in point, my P250 shoes that are now falling apart. Yes I know, I'm not a wise shopper. But I digress.

Anyway, that is why it is so hard for me to fathom the idea of spending almost half a million pesos just for a one-day event. With that amount, we could already pay for the downpayment of our house or even buy a car! When I was doing our initial wedding budget, I was so overwhelmed with the growing expenses that I told Mox we should just skip the whole wedding hoopla and just have a simple church ceremony (no entourage, no wedding march, etc.). For the reception, we'll just have it at a simple restaurant. But Mox said HE wanted to walk down the aisle and have a bonggang reception, with a band and all the works. Sus, mas maarte pa siya sa bride. Haha!

At first, our wedding budget was set at P250,000 maximum for 100 guests. Then the guest list increased to 150 guests so I had to change our budget to P300,000 max. In my computation table, I  had a list of suppliers that fit our budget and our chosen packages with them. But since the start of the year, most of them (yes, even my non-negotiables) increased their rates so I had to adjust my budget again to accommodate the price increases. Plus, Mox had some few requests like a mobile bar and a full band, so that was added to the computation as well. After all those changes, the grand total came to P350,000 max for 150 guests. Ouch, ang sakit na nito sa bulsa!

Here is a sample of my wedding budget computation. I made several versions to see how much we could save if we choose different catering packages and whether or not we could afford getting both a full band and mobile bar.  

Nahihilo na ako sa sobrang daming computations

These tables will hopefully help us be realistic with our wedding plans and stay within our set budget. Ayoko nang gumastos ng higit sa P350,000 para sa kasal namin. The cheapskate in me will definitely not approve of that. Haha. Grabe, ang mahal na talagang magpakasal.