It's certainly not news that weddings - both our own and other people's - are a huge expense, but we're shocked to see just how much they cost.
According to research by online marketplace eBay.co.uk, Brits will spend an estimated £18 billion to attend weddings, hens and stag dos this summer.
While it's no surprise that our own weddings are expensive, shockingly, the research revealed that being a wedding guest will cost a whopping £11 billion for attendees.
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The study showed that nearly one in 12 (8%) of 25 to 44-year-olds spend £1,200 attending weddings each summer.
But it doesn't stop there: if you're friendly enough with the bride or groom to have the honour (and/or financial burden) of being invited on the hen or stag, you'll be contributing to the massive £7 billion spent across the UK on attending the festivities.
Perhaps unsurprisingly, it's the stags who spend considerably more before the wedding, with one in six (15%) spending from £200 to £2000 on the big weekend, and only one in ten (9.4%) hens splashing the same amount.
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While we're spending a massive £18 billion on weddings, we spend even more on trips abroad, with Brits expected to spend a huge £32 billion on our summer holidays.
In total, our summer spending will come to a huge £80 billion once you also consider how much we're spending on sports, festivals and hen weekends away.
All this spending comes at a price: according to the survey of 2,000 Brits, over half of us have said we'll have to forgo quality time with friends and loved ones in order to pay for it, including skipping dinner with a friend and missing out on birthday celebrations.
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"Summers are usually a great time to be out socialising but it doesn't always come cheap, especially in this current financial climate. It's a shame to see that half of Brits will have to cut back on their summer fun due to the high expense," says Nikin Patel, Director of Consumer Selling at eBay UK.
"However, all is not lost. Luckily, we can simply look around our homes to things we no longer use or need to earn a little extra cash. You can trade in anything from an old tech to vintage clothing to pay for a summer you'll love and remember for years to come."
Right, time to flog all our unnecessary ASOS buys on eBay to pay to go to yet another wedding...
Featured Image Credit: Unsplash