Wednesday 9th March 2011
With the lavish ceremonies of celebrities publicised extensively and the Royal Wedding fast approaching, our dream ‘fairy tale’ weddings are landing us in very real debt.
The less than dreamy wedding loan...Many consumers are facing financial vulnerability by taking out loans to cover the cost of their ‘special day’, and rising unemployment and poor credit ratings do not seem to have deterred their splurges. According to The Money Advice Group Ltd, ‘couples can borrow on average £26,000 to fund their weddings, which can take 16 years to pay off’. With the average marriage lasting only 11.5 years, this is certainly a worrying statistic. According to Kensington Financial Management Consultants (KFMC), before the recession came along, a wedding loan was ‘just another debt’ to add to the pile for a lot of credit-happy young Britons. Now though, the debt is a monthly headache.
Recession does little to stop our splurges...Work and Pensions secretary Iain Duncan Smith recently warned of the dangers of overspending on weddings, and the consequent debt problems which couples could be thrown into as a result. He also claimed that recent research revealed that up to 90 per cent of young couples surveyed wanted to get married, but the financial implications put them off. But on the streets of London, it seems that the wedding industry is faced with more, not less, demanding customers.When visiting a local Bridal shop I was asked to return a few hours later as the manager was ‘too busy’ dealing with dress alterations to speak with me immediately.The owner of Sesay Bridalwear, a bridal shop in North West London, said:“Despite the recession I haven’t seen a fall in demand for the bridal services I offer, I think this is because my business is very personal, I design and manufacture the wedding dresses and encourage the client’s input. There’s been a surge in demand for vintage clothing recently, and my dresses, which range from £1000 to £2000, fit that look so this could perhaps explain why I haven’t been affected by the economic downturn.”The cost of an average wedding is the same as a family car, but some believe that we can have the ‘perfect’ wedding for less. Beverley Budsworth, Managing Director of The Business Debt Advisor, said: “The glossy magazines lead us to believe we can have it all – a fairytale wedding, designer home and a lifestyle to match. In reality we end up with unmanageable debt. We do seem to throw caution to the wind when it comes to weddings. The average cost of a wedding is (according to Wedding Guide UK) £11,000, and that includes a wedding dress for £700 only. It soon mounts up and quite often the costs overrun by 15 to 20 per cent which can be a further £1,650 to £2,200.“It is essential that you stick to a sensible budget that you can afford. You really don’t want to wake up to a debt hangover as a result of your wedding which can and does often break up that fairy tale partnership because of the pressure that debt brings.”Stuart Parkin, Managing Director of KFMC, added:“Weddings don’t have to break the bank. You can still have your perfect day without the designer price tag and strain of a loan. At a time when one in three marriages end in divorce, just look at what else you could have spent £26,000 on for a happier marriage.”
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