Thursday, November 17, 2011

Be Smart

The biggest mistake a lot of people do when it comes to wedding-related-financial-planning is to perceived the wedding to be the happy ending to a love story when really, its a beginning for a life-long commitment. 

They tend to throw all their effort and money to accomplished this. Please people. Be wise. Think deep. Stop relating yourself to all the movies and drama series that you have been watching repeatedly. You are not Cinderella. And you certainly aren't marrying Prince Charming. 

Marriage doesn't ends when the wedding reception is over. In fact, as people are packing up and cleaning up the wedding hall, that's the exact point of which marks the commencement of a new chapter in one's life. Yes, it is just a new chapter - there's more to come. Having a baby opens up another chapter. Another baby and yet another chapter. Switching jobs, buying a home, upgrading your ride, moving states - these are all important part of one's life, significant enough for a new episode in his "book". 

Another common  mistake (or probably lack of knowledge) is the inability to tell apart fund-availability to affordability. If you have rm50k available in your hand, I will strongly suggest you spend no more than rm15k for your wedding. That's what I call affordability. Having rm50k does not entitle you to spend it all for a wedding. I call that stupid. What's even more stupid is to spend rm50k when you only have rm30k in hand. I call that brainless. 

Its like going for a full month road trip to Europe. Everyone dream of it. They save money that lasts them for the whole journey. Accommodations, meals, sightseeing tours, souvenirs, transportation, clothes etc. Stupid person will work their butt-off and when he gets enough fund, he spend it all on a first class air ticket to London. I don't need to discuss furthermore. You could guess what happen next, I supposed? 

So girls, before you even start picturing your fairy-tale wedding, please asses your affordability and be smart. Practice balance. Why spend 100% on a day that counts for only 1% of the whole journey?