Today we are going to discuss the question
that plagues us all. How much should you spend on the engagement ring?
Obviously, this is a core question that's
going to be important for anybody looking to get engaged.
And today we're going to dive into to some of the common formulas that are out there.
We want to unpackage it help you guys
figure out why it's outdated and understanding where these come from.
More importantly, we're going to show you three ways, three different ways on how
you can figure out realistically what to budget or how to figure out your budget.
And lastly, we also want to just give you guys some additional tips as well.
In addition to those methods.
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Okay, so you're going to think about
getting engaged and you're going to start asking friends, or maybe you're going
to Google this and how much you're going to spend.
And one of the most common answers you're
going to hear, you're going to hear someone say something like, hey, listen,
I heard you're supposed to spend, like, two to three months of your salary.
Is that true? Or I think that's a guide.
So here's the thing.
The two to three months salary rule is marketing.
It was created by DeBeers post World War Two.
So the mining company created this. Serves one party, not necessarily yourself.
So beyond the marketing, beyond the fact that you probably heard
this, maybe even from your parents or friends, let's break it down.
How can two to three months salary be relevant across the board?
It really depends.
We're not all making the same amount of salary.
Also, cost of living is drastically
diverse, depending on the city you live in.
A diamond is going to cost the same in Toronto or Kansas,
but you have totally different lifestyles and expenditures there.
So the next most common thing we hear is
someone will come in looking for an engagement ring and say, hey,
I need it to be a one carat a two carat, some around carat and number.
And that is a very common thing.
So it's not so much that you're just trying to figure out how much to spend.
But you just feel like I should be getting
at least this not really understanding what it is.
So first of all, carat is what we often
will say is the most meaningless concept that is out there.
We did a whole video on this,
which we will link to so you can go into it in more detail.
But take a look at these three stones. Okay.
They're different sizes.
They are all one carat in weight each.
And the reason for that is carat is a measure of weight.
It is not a measure of size, just to kind of explain this.
It's very common that when you start going or looking at advertisements or seeing ads
for stones, you often will see the carat being posted.
So one carat is on sale for X 99, a two car for Y 99.
And so it's very common that because
of that prevalence, it almost feels like a rule, like I should at least get that.
Or you'll often hear like, hey, her friend says she wants at least one carat.
That's something we hear all the time.
But it's really important to unpackage it and understand what it means
and to understand why it actually doesn't really mean what people think it means.
We really want to encourage our clients not to get fixated on the carat number.
The carrot threshold, because all it is is a marketing trap.
If you're going to fixate so much
on the carat weight, you're going to lose out to be able to discover the diamond
that is right for you.
Now that we have dispelled two of the most common myths, we want to kind of move
into three useful methods that we've employed and continue to use with our
existing clients that they found really helpful.
The first one is what we call a range method.
Okay, so first of all, for this method to work,
we're going to assume that you kind of already figured out at least roughly
what you're thinking from a style perspective.
Okay. And the range method is simply this:
come up with a broad budget range that you're comfortable sitting with.
The key is broad.
Okay, so think of something like, hey,
I'm comfortable anywhere from, like, four to eight.
Eight is not where I really want to go, but 8000 is somewhere like, yeah,
maybe you have to liquidate stock, but you're willing to kind of entertain it.
And essentially what we do is we will show you all your options side by side
and increments so you can see what the different prices will get you.
And essentially what the range method is is it is a cost benefit analysis method
where you might be able to see, hey, here's what I get at four.
Here's what I get at six.
You see all these things side by side, and it's going to allow you to basically,
maybe you're someone that's, like, from four and six.
All the options I see there, I could definitely see what I get.
I see a sizeable jump.
Maybe you're like, I don't see a sizeable difference.
So it just does not make sense for you to do that.
And so it just allows everybody to figure out where their comfort ranges.
To figure that out.
The reason why we like the range method so much is that it's so hard to tell how far
your dollar goes unless you're looking at the diamonds themselves.
When you have an itemized price breakdown and you're able to see them side by side,
you really are able to assess if you are going to end up at the top of your range.
If it's a value add for you now,
not everybody is going to end up extending out to the top end of their range.
You may be very happy with what would be considered mid range or low range,
but again, it's a discovery that's highly personal and highly subjective.
The second method is a different way to go about it.
And this is one where we just call the style method.
And so where the first one?
We are assuming that you already kind of know what you like.
This is a little bit different.
So this is one where you just start with the style.
Do not worry about price at all.
So with a lot of our clients, we'll say, hey, let's just explore and she'll just
pick out different styles, and we get to a point where we have
a broad starting point and just figure out the look that she likes, like,
figure out the look of the stone or the size, whatever it is.
It's not always going to be big, but we kind of land more on.
Let's figure out what she likes first.
And then from there,
we can show all the different ways, like the different ranges.
Hey, if we made this with a mined diamond,
it would put you in X to Y if it was with a grown.
And if it's with moissanite.
And like, there's so many different options, more of what you could read
in some of our other videos, which we'll link to, but intrinsically.
A lot of times when you see all those
different budget ranges, most people will know that's not where I
want to be, but, yeah, this and this option.
Yeah, actually, that can work.
What's great about the style approach is that if you are able to ascertain her
dream design, there's so many different ways that we can achieve that look.
We're not like our parents generation where it was diamond or bust.
We have so many options you could do
Labrone, natural Diamond, Sapphire, Topaz moistenite.
There's so many different ways that we
could achieve a desired look with different price points because all
these stones have very different price tags attached to them.
The last method is one of our favorites, and sometimes we call it the blind test.
And it's essentially this for this one
to work is you have to have a good sense of what you want from a style perspective.
And again, it's a variation of the range Finder.
But what we'll say is we will come up with a budget.
But what we like to do is we will show our
clients all their options side by side, completely random.
We will not mention what they are.
We will not mention what the prices are, and we just let our clients look at them.
We want you to experience it.
We want you to choose it with your heart.
And what's kind of interesting when we do
this is the whole idea is that all of them will work within your budget.
Okay, so you're not going to feel like
you're going to break the bank or uncomfortable.
However, what is also kind of very
interesting is that we do often find that the stone that you like the best
doesn't necessarily mean it's the most expensive stone in there.
It often is not actually.
We're so subjective in our color sensitivity or inclusion sensitivity.
Sometimes the stone feels too big for one person and not big enough for another.
So what's nice about the blind test is that when you go into it completely open
hearted, you don't know exactly what everything cost.
You're just able to enjoy them for what
they are, and then you leave it to your eyes to pick out what's beautiful to you.
And then, of course, as Ji was saying, we're still going to make sure that it's
within the budget range that you want to spend, so it will be a win win.
Last point about this.
What's great, too, is
especially if you're not sure which options I'm talking about the type
of stone, whether it's a mined, diamond grown or moissanite.
Let's say you're okay with all three.
We will sort them in there.
We'll throw them in there in the selection that will show our clients.
And we're not going to say which one is which because that's another way to do it,
because you may just really like the look of something.
And the budget is just a super practical
thing, just so that all of them work really well.
So
it's an option that allows you to experience and pick the thing,
pick the stone that best suits you.
So as we end this thing off,
we want to kind of go over now some additional tips and things to consider.
The first one is what we will call buy now, upgrade later.
And really what it is is so many of you
will just look at the engaging as a one and done.
And we say not really, not necessarily.
There are very different variations of this, and we're all unpackaged it.
So first of all, what we offer with both diamonds that are
mined and grown, we give our clients the ability to treat back their stone.
We give them 100% back for whatever they paid for it.
They can just upgrade, basically pay the difference.
The whole benefit of that is how you get
what you can afford right now or you're comfortable with and down the road.
You might be at a different point, milestone, celebration.
You can just upgrade it.
And a lot of our clients love that.
I love this idea of looking at your ring
as something to grow into, grow with your relationship.
We have many clients that love the trade up policy because
I think five years tends to be a very popular time to trade up on their diamond.
But then we also have some clients
that would never want to trade up because they're very sentimental about
the original diamond and design that they got.
You want to consider the life circumstance that you're in.
We have some doctors,
they're residents, and they have hundreds of thousands of dollars of debt.
You want to consider that, but you don't want to put off the engagement.
There's so many options to you.
It doesn't have to be a one and done. Another variation I'll give you is this so
we have some clients where there's a style that she loves.
Maybe it's a very elaborate style,
and it does require a certain size of stone for you to pull it off.
And maybe the ring itself is quite expensive.
I'm talking about the ring setting, not including the center stone.
And another thing sometimes we've done
that's common is we'll build the ring exactly the way it is.
But for the center stone, we'll put something like a swarovski crystal,
and some people are fine with that.
Or the other thing is that they're using
that as a kind of placeholder, if you will to be replaced later.
And it's a fantastic thing.
It looks great, but it's kind of like
temporary kind of work in progress, if you will.
So we want to address those of you that are not interested in changing
the design in the future that really want this to be the one and only.
We want you to consider, since it is going to be the one and only
she's going to be wearing this for the rest of her life.
So you really want to amortize that over your lifetime.
And so if it means that you're going
to have to stretch your budget to get her exactly what she wants, I'm all for it.
I'm a little bit more practical, and I like to just say, hey,
come up with a budget or a range that you're comfortable with.
You want to be somewhat practical, but she is right.
So figure the fact that, hey, whatever she wants.
And maybe it's X amount of dollars above what you're comfortable with.
But amortize that over 30, 40, 50 years and consider that most of us will
end up spending more money on a car, obviously a house.
Those things will change.
But this is something she wears for the rest of her life everyday.
And we always say to clients,
it's up to you to figure out where within that tension you're comfortable.
So take the time to learn all the options that are available to you.
We said earlier in our parents generation, it was diamond or bust.
Today we have so many different stone options that are available.
You can watch videos that we've done
on how you can get a $30,000 ring for $3,000 or less.
We've done videos on lab versus natural diamonds.
Diamond Alternatives, moistenite.
These are all these different options and it's just understanding that there's
way more options than you may realize and take the time to understand them.
So when it comes to how much you should
spend on the engagement ring, we hope that this was a great starting off point.
But really, truly, we would love to meet with you in person or online where we will
take your budget range and your wish list and bring them together for you.