The Unwavering Dream of Italian Weddings: Costs and Trends

Italians choosing to get married do not give up on dream weddings, despite the costs; on average 13,721 euros according to the survey commissioned by Facile.it to mUp Research and Norstat and related to the last 24 months. A significant figure so much so that, among those who have not married, 21% declared they gave up for economic reasons. It is noteworthy how the costs to organize the wedding have increased considerably over time; if in the eighties between dresses, invitations, flowers, and ceremony were enough just over 7,000 euros, those who got married in the last two years had to budget, on average, almost double. There are also those who do not care about expenses and in the same time frame, the share of those who paid between 20,000 and 50,000 euros went from 3% to 21%. Costs are significant so much so that, as emerged from the survey, more than 7 out of 10 couples had to ask for help. Parents remain the first option, but the number of spouses opting for a personal loan is growing. If in the '80s and '90s it was a practice almost entirely absent, in the last two years the percentage of spouses who requested a loan has reached 10%. "The relationship of Italians with consumer credit is increasingly mature," explain the experts at Facile.it. "This type of product, if used with awareness, can be a solution both to not give up on a dream and to make the expense more sustainable on the family budget." The loans According to the analysis by Facile.it and Prestiti.it - conducted on a sample of over 200,000 requests collected in the last year - those who applied for financing to pay for wedding or ceremony expenses aimed to obtain, on average, just over 9,000 euros, with a repayment plan of 5 years. Curious to note the increase in the average age of applicants, which went from 39 to 41 years. Looking at the territorial trend of loan applications, it emerges that the regions where the percentage weight of this type of financing on the total requests is greater are Campania, Puglia, Sicily, and Calabria. Marriage, territorial and generational differences How marriage has changed over the years and how its cost varies along the Boot? Looking at the results of the survey, some interesting phenomena emerge; the budget needed for the ceremony, for example, is normally higher in the regions of Southern Italy and the Islands, where, on average, between 14% and 17% more is spent compared to the North. This data should also be read in function of the number of guests: if in Northern Italy the participants at a wedding are, always on average, less than 80, in the South and the Islands they reach 110, and even in 10% of cases take part in the party between 200 and 300 people (percentage that, instead, drops below 1% in the North West). Along with the number of guests, which has remained substantially stable over time, the custom of getting married in the region of origin of at least one of the spouses resists the passage of generations; just 4% of couples chose to celebrate the wedding outside these borders. Gifts change too To change on a territorial and generational basis, instead, are the gifts made by the guests; the envelope with cash has been for 40 years the most common gift (about 50%). On the other hand, over time the percentage of those who show up at the ceremony with a physical object has significantly decreased (47% in the '80s, 23% today). The wedding list, on the other hand, continues to be used, albeit less than in the past (it was 48% forty years ago, it is 36% today), while the use of the bank transfer as a contribution to the honeymoon has grown significantly in the last 20 years; it was 6% at the beginning of 2000, today it represents 26%) The honeymoon, in fact, is not given up; according to the survey 8 out of 10 couples do it, even if lately the percentage of those who postpone the date has grown and now more than one couple out of four chooses to leave far from the ceremony.