The following is a guest post from our friend Jessica at Mo’ Money Mo’ Houses. If you are interested in guest posting, please see our guest posting guidelines.

Hi! My name is Jessica and I blog over at Mo’ Money Mo’ Houses, the personal finance & lifestyle blog with a dash of sass.

If you’re like most people, you may have dreamed about your wedding day since you were a little kid. But, did you also dream about maxing out your credit cards, asking your parents for money, and still going into debt after the “I do”s? Probably not, but unfortunately that is a sad reality for many couples who may not have crunched a few crucial numbers when deciding to throw a big, fat, traditional wedding.

You may have heard that the average wedding today costs around $26,000. I know that sounds like a ridiculous amount of money to spend on one day, but believe me, it’s not a hard task to do if you aren’t paying attention. I’m actually just a few months away from my very own wedding, and despite being extremely frugal and a personal finance blogger to boot, my wedding is not going to be cheap. It’s definitely nowhere close to the average, but it’s looking like it will cost my fiancé and I about $15,000. And that’s not including both of our bachelor and bachelorette parties in Las Vegas!

So, why are weddings so darn expensive? Here’s a look at a few price tags to give you an idea….. [Read more...]