So my parents gave both me and my sister a $40k wedding budget when we got engaged. She had her wedding last year and spent about $60k total for a really great wedding weekend on the beach in summer. We’ve been engaged for 3 years and due to certain things are just now buckling down to plan before then I did research on venues and costs. The type of wedding I dream of has a cost of around $40k. My fiancé could care less about the venue as long as I love it.

My fiancé cannot fathom the cost of a wedding when you could buy a house with that money. It wasn’t until a few weeks ago that my fiancé actually brought up planning. I gave him costs I had since prices went up. I tell him I had one at $27k, one venue was $35k and another $38k. He immediately goes “you know that’s house money?” so I explained we had money from my parents to cover most of it. He then goes “I’m not taking your parents money” I was shocked to hear this. We end up talking later on that night and I asked him why. He tells me “to be honest I don’t want your dad having a hand in the wedding” Now my dad is a drug addict who’s been to rehab. I gather my fiancé doesn’t care for him based on choices he’s made.

My fiancé starts looking at weddings under $20k. Like I said before a basic wedding near us for our numbers is $40k. He then starts discussing a backyard wedding and how we could do it cheap. I explained tent quotes I had where $10k(standard nice wedding tent) and we’d have to outsource bathrooms ect. He tells me we can get a tent for $1,000 and no need for bathrooms his moms house can handle 175 people. I’m 100% against a backyard wedding. The research shows you spend more in everything you have to rent. I’m having to grieve the wedding I’ve always dreamed about having because he won’t take my parents money. I’ve offered to contribute and he very sweetly told me no.

When we were home over Halloween his sister got him excited about planning and offered to look. He said max he could spend is $35k and that was it. Anything over that he couldn’t contribute. On the way home he mentioned having my parents contribute to vendors but after I explained my dad had no hand in my sisters wedding he goes “we’ll discuss it” Now after a friends wedding weekend he’s back on the spend as little as possible but have everyone there train. He said if we don’t spend $40k on a wedding we can afford to buy a beach cottage as well as a house which I’d love but we’re realistically 2 years out from house buying and I’m skeptical he’d actually want to buy a beach house.

I don’t know what to do.