Financing the Wedding

Here's how we financed the wedding: partly our own savings and the rest through rental income.

We're lucky in a few respects. I own my home. Even in this down economy, I was able to rent it out. I preferred to live in Dean's place because of its proximity to work. His place is $1,200 and we have valet parking.

We each put in $5,000 for a total of $10,000 of our own savings.
My first tenant paid $1,800 for each month of her three-month summer internship. She didn't use the parking spot.
My current tenant pays $2,000 a month which includes parking. He's been in my place for three months so far.
My mortgage is $1,800 with HOAs of $100 so all the rent was mainly upside.

We've put away a grand total of $21,400 into an account that's strictly for the wedding. There's a bit more in there because of interest and Dean's family sent in a few congratulatory checks when they found out we were getting married. That's more than enough. I swore up and down I could hold myself to a budget of $15,000, but we're adding in a few things I'm sure our guests will be pleased with. We're also upping our guest count to a maximum of 150. Even at 150 guests, the wedding will be less than $20,000.

The next post will be a complete update, including a detailed list of our vendors.