The average cost of weddings rises each year, like clockwork. Zola's Wedding Cost Index puts the average cost at $36,000 for 2026, while The Knot's Real Wedding Study lists it slightly lower at $34,200.

Those numbers are high, but in reality, many couples are spending much more on their big days. Some have large guest lists, others want to splurge on flowers or decor, and many couples only have expensive venues available to them.

Some couples, though, are managing to pull off their dream weddings for less, like Hannah and Drew Williams. Their intimate wedding cost a little over $21,000. Here's how they did it.

Hannah Williams did not expect to meet the love of her life when she moved to a new city.

In 2022, Hannah, now a 29-year-old mental health therapist, was ready for a change. She had spent her entire life on the East Coast, growing up in Southampton, New York, and attending school in Boston and New York City.

After grad school, after COVID, I was like, Let me just try a new city, she told Business Insider. I was like, If I do not leave now, I will never leave.

She decided to make a fresh start in Denver, telling herself she could always return home if it did not work out. Hannah only knew one person in Denver, a friend from college, who eagerly introduced her to the community he had built in the city in the spring of 2022. One of those people was Drew Williams.

It was nice that I got to meet him organically, Hannah said, adding that she quickly fell in love with how patient, thoughtful, and family-oriented Drew is.

By the fall of 2024, they were engaged.

They wanted their wedding to feel sentimental with retro touches.

Hannah and Drew agreed they wanted their wedding to feel intimate and personal. I am very sentimental, Hannah said. Every single thing in our house has a story to it. So I really wanted every single thing to mean something.

Hannah is also passionate about vintage and thrifted decor, so she hoped to buy as much of their decor secondhand as she could. That personalized, vintage aesthetic led the couple to a small wedding, as did Hannah's thoughts on the planning process.

I love big weddings, Hannah said. But I am so type A to a fault, and I knew it would not be a fun process for me to do a big wedding. There is the seating chart of 300 people, the invitations, and all of this stuff. I knew that it would really take it out of me, so for our own benefit, I was like, I think that a smaller wedding might be really nice.

They set their wedding date for September 19, 2025, and invited just 33 guests. They threw a more laid-back party with their friends in March 2026, so they still got to celebrate with everyone despite keeping their nuptials intimate.

That was the best thing we could have done, she said. For me to put all the planning and detail into it that I wanted to do, I knew that a smaller wedding was going to be more our vibe.

The Williamses set their budget after talking to their parents.

Hannah and Drew were prepared to pay for their wedding themselves if necessary. We probably both could have put in $10,000 each, so $20,000 was our budget, Hannah said.

However, their parents were all happy to support their nuptials financially, so they did not have to spend as much of their own money. Our parents are all divorced, so we had four people that we were able to ask for money, which was helpful, she said.

Each of their parents contributed $5,000 to their wedding fund for a total of $20,000. Hannah and Drew planned to rely on their parents' money for most of the wedding budget, but they knew they had their own funds as backup.

They tied the knot in the Hamptons at a rental home.

The couple said their vows at a house Hannah said is a stone's throw away from her childhood home in Southampton, New York. They first considered getting married on the beach or at a park in town, but then Drew's mom sent them the listing for the Vrbo she was planning to rent for the wedding weekend in Towd Point.

When Hannah and Drew saw photos of the property overlooking the bay, they were smitten. They received the Vrbo owner's approval to host their wedding there, and the couple went out of their way to ensure the event would not disturb the neighboring homes, gifting them notes and bottles of wine.

Because Drew's mother and her two siblings were staying at the Vrbo for the three days of the wedding weekend, the couple did not include the venue cost in their wedding budget, though it cost around $3,000.

The couple did not have a traditional wedding setup.

Rather than having a ceremony followed by a reception, Hannah and Drew decided to set aside two hours for their ceremony, using the first hour as a modified cocktail hour and then transitioning into the ceremony. They provided drinks for their guests, which Hannah said was surprisingly affordable.

We budgeted like $600 for the drinks, and it ended up being like $300, she said. They also provided a high-end charcuterie board that cost $400, though it was a gift for the day from Hannah's mom rather than a part of their official wedding budget.

My mom is so low-key, but there are a couple of things that she is particular about, she said. It is always the guest experience, and one of the things was food. I was like, Someone can just put out charcuterie, and she was like, Absolutely not. I do not want anyone to deal with it, and I want people to be able to eat.

Hannah bought her gown secondhand.

Hannah tried on wedding gowns at several boutiques, but she soon found modern dresses were not speaking to her. They just did not feel like me, she said. I knew I wanted this kind of aged look.

She ended up finding the perfect gown during a trip to Los Angeles at Transplant Vintage. The gown had a boat-style neckline, was cinched at the waist, flowed into a column-style skirt, and featured a patterned overlay that added dimension. Hannah loved the look and how comfortable it was. The dress cost $800. Hannah paired it with a $60 veil and red heels for a fun pop of color.

Drew got a green suit for the wedding.

Drew is not very formal, so he wanted to find a suit that fit his style. We really wanted something that he was going to feel comfortable in, Hannah said. Drew ended up selecting a sage-green, linen suit from Indochino, which cost $750. Hannah said he has already worn it again to three other weddings, making it well worth the cost.

Hannah thrifted as much of her wedding decor as possible.

Hannah is a passionate thrifter, and it was important to her that she could incorporate her love of secondhand pieces into her wedding. She spent months attending estate sales both in person and online on sites like estatesales.net and auctionninja.com, searching for the perfect decor.

I purposefully started pretty much as soon as we got engaged because I wanted it to be fun for me, Hannah said. I was going at least once a week.

She said she homed in on her vision for the decor with the help of Pinterest, so she could go to estate sales and search online with intention for everything from plates for dinner to decor pieces for the ceremony.

I did blue cobalt glasses for dinner, so I would be Googling on eBay blue cobalt glasses every day to see what was popping up, she said. Then, I would order it and send it to my mom's house here in the Hamptons.

She also thrifted furniture online to display the decor she got. The hutch for the glasses, a drink table, and a guest book table cost $30 together from Facebook Marketplace.

It took Hannah months to find all the decor she wanted.

Hannah kept track of her decor finds in a spreadsheet, ticking off each item as she shopped. In addition to the multicolored glasses she found for their ceremony, she bought brass ice buckets to hold drinks, coordinating candlesticks, and picture frames. A few weeks before the wedding, she bought porcelain bells for guests to ring during the ceremony, and her mom spent $100 on ceremony chairs on Amazon.

Hannah slowly transferred the items she bought for the wedding from Denver to New York over the course of her engagement. Her mom also took items back with her after visits, and Hannah's best friend took some of the pieces with her when she moved across the country. The process was lengthy, but eventually, all of the decor made it to New York for the wedding.

The couple kept some of their decor after the wedding and resold other pieces.

After the event, Hannah and Drew held on to several meaningful items while selling others online to recoup costs and pass along the vintage finds to new owners.