New week, new series.
If there’s one thing we 20-nothings do very well it’s maintain that we have no clue as to how to direct our own personal and professional lives while being fully in control of how everyone around us should live theirs’. It’s not that we’re hypocrites (though many of us are that too) – it’s more like we’re chronic back seat drivers who openly admit we can’t pilot the vehicle ourselves.
So – to help work that judgment-from-afar muscle, I’ll be posing hypotheticals specific to our set for all to evaluate. Consider it a way to get your fix without deeply pissing off people you actually know.
A guy and a girl have been dating for some time – say 3 years? There has been talk of marriage and mutual agreement it’s eventually going to happen. Naturally the she of the they has expressed a desire for it to happen soon.
Now in this particular situation that she is in a stable career with strong job security making a sizable salary. We’ll call her a derivatives trader because that sounds like something that would make someone a lot of money. The guy, not so much. He’s a writer or actor or aspiring professional musician. He’s making rent, but that’s about it. Every penny he’s able to scrape away is used in pursuit of his passion, and there is no 5-year-plan to shift gears from starving artist to plan B.
Now the guy is fully ready to propose – has been for some time – but owing to his financial situation, he can’t afford a ring. Hm, correction, he can’t afford a ring that costs more than, say, 1K, and that’s assuming he’s either resolved the bad credit issue previously preventing him from getting another credit card or that his parents will throw him a thousand bones for an engagement ring.
A quick note on thousand-dollar engagement rings. They certainly, certainly exist. They are certainly not what the girl in our hypothetical wants. And, and I may get in trouble for this, they’re not what most girls want…
So let’s – for the sake of argument in this exercise – say our guy knows the 1K option is not an option. He doesn’t have the credit, he can’t borrow the money, and he needs at least 5K as it is.
At his current rate of saving given his current life situation it will take him three more years to save 5K – maayybbee two years if he drastically alters his lifestyle and way de-prioritizes his passion.
And to make matters more challenging for you experts out there – clock is ticking with the girl. While she doesn’t want him to deny his dreams, she’s nervous about what this prescribes for the future.
So 21st-century yentas – what should they do??
The way I see it, there are the following options:
- He explains to her the financial situation and they settle on a proposal marked with a ring of very low monetary value (we’re talking 400 bucks) that she can trade up once he’s able to afford something larger or no ring at all.
- He borrows the money from someone and sets up a payment plan with them like he would with a credit card if his credit were stable.
- They pool make the decision to pool their finances/savings and together buy her a ring knowing that “together” is essentially her.
- He drastically alters his entire life to begin a strong savings plan that allows him to propose in the next year. We’re talking new apartment in a new part of town. New or supplemental work. Significant adjustments to social life including his life with her.
- She decides that she can wait to get engaged until he’s in a position to propose with a ring he bought on his own, even if that means she waits five more years.
I think that covers it, but feel free to explore other options in comments. I’ve purposefully left off, “she leaves him” because this specific scenario is about how two people compromise, but if you think that’s the correct decision, feel free to suggest.
Okay. Ready. Set. JUDGE!
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Great idea for a topic!
I think that if two people have come to the decision that they want to spent the rest of their lives together that they can figure out a compromise about a ring so that they can get married when they want to.
That being said, these days the bride-to-be’s parents may not always be willing to pay for the whole wedding and therefore the couple may be required to cover some of the wedding expenses (if not all) themselves, in which case waiting until a more financially stable situation comes along may not be such a bad idea. Or she can just pay for it.
This probably makes me a sucker but I actually paid for my own engagement ring. My fiance wasn’t really in the position to pay for it and I was so we picked one out together and I pretty much paid it off myself. Our bills were combined anyway so it didn’t really matter to me at the time. In hindsight, I probably should have just opted for a ring he could afford since we’d have our whole life to upgrade. Now that all is said and done, we aren’t even together anymore and I’m stuck with a 2K ring. What does one do with an old engagement ring?
Ideally, women would say that it’s the thought that counts and that any ring he can afford to get her would be good enough…but we all know that is just not how it works. We want something nice to show off to everyone…Something that will sparkle in the light and make other women envy us. I guess this is a difficult predicament to think about…I think most guys would like to save up to buy their girlfriend something that is really nice, but I think that they often feel pressure to hurry up and propose, which causes them to get a ring that might not be up to our standards. I guess in the end it really requires the patient of the women, and the willingness of the guy to work to save up for something that both he and the woman can be proud of.
This scenario made me really sad. Ideally, it wouldn’t matter because you love the person. Even if it mattered, I think you have to judge the ring coming from the person who’s giving it. $1,000 is a lot of money to this particular guy who’s living paycheck to paycheck. Another guy may be able to save/charge $5K without thinking about it, but that doens’t make the $1K guesture any less grand since it’s the top of his budget.
Also, where’s the option of trading the ring up on a 10 year anniversary when you are both (hopefully) financially stable.
I don’t know, I got a ~$1,000 engagement ring and I love it. Honestly, would not have cared if it was $10 because I love the man I married more than anything I own.
Tara nailed it… “We [women] want something nice to show off to everyone…Something that will sparkle in the light and make other women envy us.”
will your girlfriends envy the strength of your relationship that isn’t defined by a small rock and some metal? if the guy makes some sacrifices to afford the ring, the sacrifice is what matters, not the rock and metal. would you rather a man who can easily afford a $10k ring without thinking twice, or the guy who spent years of his life toiling away to give you something so “precious.” how would you feel knowing that he altered his life to such an extent to fulfill a superficial tradition of yours?
Wait one second…I know plenty of women that would be extremely happy with a 1k ring. Personally, I believe a 5k ring is outrageous given you’re spending the rest of your lives together with plenty of time for upgrades and who wants a 5k liability on their hand everyday?
My opinion will be unpopular, but she should break up with him! Not because of his lack of finances, but because of his lack of stability and direction. She is a successful professional (likely with a plan of where she would like to see herself in 5 years), and he has no stability and no plan for how to achieve that? There is a clear incompatability here, and she will eventually be unhappy that he is not as stable as she is.
I agree with Adria. I also think that viewing a ring as a major stumbling block to marriage seems a bit insane. (Spending $1,000 on a ring seems crazy to me as well, but then I work for non-profits.)
Marriage is so much more than the ring or even, dare I say, the wedding. I’d much rather start my marriage on sound financial footing than spend thousands of dollars on the ceremony around getting married.
i think they should forget the ring. the ring is not the important part. what i would be more concerned about is whether she is going to be comfortable in paying all of their bills once they are married, since he has no plan to become more financially stable.
My husband made me my ring, out of stainless steel, and it’s way cooler than any other ring I’ve ever seen. It’s amazingly creative, and it cost about $250. 🙂
I am IN that situation. Except that we are both recent law school grads saddled with debt and working for the state government (him) and the federal government (me). We live separately and we make just enough to cover rent, loans, and other necessities… Oh, and these are also just 1-year appointments.
In a nutshell, we’ve been talking about marriage for over a year, I’m impatient, and I make $10k more than him (for the year). I’m giving him about a third of the cost of the ring.
I’ve even told him he can buy less than what we’ve already looked at. (So there I’d have to disagree with your size specifications – I just want something on my finger that looks legit! Everyone knows we have no money…it would look silly if I was walking around with some huge rock on my finger. Either we’re now in even more debt or Daddy stepped in.)
I actually like that I am paying for it. It’s empowering!
I’m all for focusing on the relationship over the wedding or ring or dress. I know this is harsh, but I think that weddings are far-too commercialized. If most people spent half as much time working on their marriage/relationship as they did on their wedding (including the ring, dress, expenses, etc.) I think marriage in this country would mean a completely different thing.
we both work for non-profits and my husband had a family ring to pass down. after getting it resized and cleaned, we only spent $200. we spent more on our wedding bands and bought them for each other, but combined those were ~ $1,500. i think the focus should be on the marriage and the relationship, not the jewelry. if the focus is on the jewelry – why does it matter who the guy is?
Personally I would not be able to live with myself if I accepted an expensive (or even relatively inexpensive but more than he could afford) ring from my boyfriend if I knew my expectations (legit or not, but I’m leaning toward definitely not) were imposing a hardship on him. But then again I don’t really believe in gender roles in general, but especially not in cases like this. (Why should it be the man’s responsibility to save up thousands of dollars to give his beloved a token of his love while her job is just to sit around basking in it?) If being in love and being married is the most important thing, then suck it up and do whatever is necessary for that to happen. If having your life go in the “prescribed” manner, in perfect order and with all the symbols that it’s doing so, is most important to you, well, do whatever’s necessary for that to happen (finding a guy who can do that for you, or sucking it up and buying a ring for yourself if it’s really that big a deal).
I can’t imagine what married life handling the finances of these two hypothetical people would be like if they continued with these attitudes. Is the woman going to get all pissy when the man can’t take her on vacation somewhere nice because he’s broke? Is she going to resent always being the one to pay for stuff because she secretly thinks he’s not trying hard enough or isn’t grown up enough? Or are they just going to be all what’s-mine-is-yours? If the latter, then why not start now?
This story could have been written about me! I am in this exact situation. I have a sort of multi compromise solution that worked for us. First, we are waiting to get married. This way I can continue to build my financial stability and he can find some. Whether it happens today or in 5 years, if we still love one another, what’s the difference? Second, I’m paying for about 2/3 of the ring. I understand that 5k or more may be ridiculous to some people, including my boyfriend. I have no problem with him paying what he can afford/thinks is reasonable, and he has no problem with me paying the difference for the ring I want. We all have our pitfalls when it comes to where we spend our money, and if I choose to put it into a ring, I certainly don’t think that makes me any less in love/caring/supportive of a girlfriend/wife.
I was in this exact situation about a year ago.
In the end, he saved as much as he could from his hourly job and paid $1100 for my ring from an antique shop. He even invited my dad to come with him to pick it up.
His hard work and effort to find a ring I would love in his budget was worth more to me than any $5k, $10k or even $20k cookie-cutter ring from a chain jewelry store.
Plus, I was completely surprised. I thought it would take a lot longer for him to save up for a ring and propose.
I agree with all the women who say that there are far more women out there than you have implied who don’t even want a $5K ring. I would probably kill him if he even spent $1K. I’m all for the anniversary upgrade.
While we’re on this, I think it’s outrageous that people spend thousands of dollars on a dress. That you will wear once. With someone with whom you often wear nothing.
Just sayin’.
Why ‘naturally the she’ is pushing for marriage to happen sooner? Why paint women as the ultimatum producing, pressure-putting part of all relationships? Not really helping our stereotypes over here.. ugh.
Yes I’ve known/heard of women who do this… but for the love of god, don’t generalize us all in that category.