Millennials are obsessed with expensive destination weddings — and it’s costing them friendships

They object!

Millennial couples are sparing no expense with lavish and pricey weddings at destinations far from home — leaving strained guests thinking here comes the bill, not the bride.

Lovers dreaming of saying “I do” in a castle, on the beach, or at a cute rural escape are putting pressure on family and friends now more than ever before to attend costly affairs — ruining relationships in the process.

Despite a third of people saying in a 2019 survey that having a destination wedding was selfish, couples have no plans to stop cruising into matrimony away from home — even if inflation has caused travel and lodging fees to spike.

“We noticed a big uptick in people doing destination weddings in the last six months. We’re getting a lot of requests for 2025,” New York-based event planner Cameron Forbes told The Post.

Renata Narvaez, 28, was overwhelmed after learning she was invited to five destination weddings last year — all taking place in a span of three months.

Narvaez, who works in entertainment in Los Angeles, went to two of them because they were family, but was stuck in a precarious position with the other three, due to the steep costs she’d be facing.

Narvaez estimated that the celebrations would have been about $4,000 total in gifts, airfare, hotels and rental cars as the weddings were far out from the cities they would have flown to.

A 2023 survey found these items to be the biggest roadblocks for those struggling with the cost of a destination wedding.

On top of that, Narvaez would have taken nearly half of her allowed days off from work. And her calculations didn’t even factor in funds for a new dress or other cosmetics.

“The ticket to go to these weddings is just too high,” she told The Post.

Regretful ever after

Destination weddings are becoming so popular among Millennials, or those born between 1981 and 1996, that the grand getaways have become a key factor driving the nuptial market to make nearly $9 billion extra in revenue this year, a new financial report from Research and Markets highlights.

And buckle up, because there’s no sign of over-the-top millennial matrimony slowing down anytime soon, warns wedding planner Forbes.

The Forbes Functions owner said it’s likely that brides and grooms want to “really just go all out, kind of have a built-in vacation and then maybe worry about the impact of that financial decision a little bit later down the line.”

What those couples may not be considering is, like in the case of Narvaez, that guests might be shelling out for multiple pricey ceremonies in a short period of time.

For Narvaez, it was even more of a challenge because the couples having weddings she couldn’t attend all knew each other, so she felt an obligation to attend all — or none — for the sake of their communal friendships.

“If all of your friends are going to this wedding and you’re going to be the only person that doesn’t go, that’s a lot of pressure,” added Narvaez, who is navigating more upcoming weddings this year.

“I think because of that, people can make decisions they later regret about going and realize, ‘Oh God I’m never going to financially recover from this.’”

Blame the gram

Even those who had destination weddings, like Brie Wolfe, a 33-year-old tech recruiter in Virginia, feel expectations are getting out of control.

Two years ago and while eight months pregnant, Wolfe — who had an intimate Las Vegas ceremony eight years ago — declined a faraway wedding that wouldn’t allow her to bring a plus one. Since turning it down, her relationship with the couple has become non-existent.

“I haven’t seen them since. I don’t think we’ve even really spoken beyond like the congrats about [me] having a baby and congrats on [their] wedding,” Wolfe told The Post.

Still, Wolfe questioned: why put so much effort into the extravagant event if it means nickel and diming guests who are already coming on their pretty penny?

The answer she’s found is that people want to look like they’re living the high life online.

“I feel like [brides are now] just expecting to have these huge, Instagramable weddings,” Wolfe, who is the co-host of the relationship podcast “We Hate Your Baby Daddy,” said.

She’s not wrong. The Research and Markets report found that “the expanding use of social media is propelling the destination wedding market.”

Wolfe’s Philadelphia-based co-host, Khadi Hairston, 27, who works in shipping tracking, has seen the same, especially after choosing not to go to a cousin’s wedding in Puerto Rico.

“I think she was just trying to get people so she could have bodies in her pictures for Instagram,“ Hairston told The Post.

Buyer’s remorse

The party-first, pay-later method is bold thinking for an age group struggling to afford houses and make ends meet, as a recent report found that a salary of $150,000 is viewed as lower middle class in some major U.S. cities.

Yet, come the big day, the popular millennial attitude is to spare no expense. Apparently, they expect the same from the company they keep.

Forbes said that the hot destinations are Mexico and Europe, with the most desired setting at the moment being an Italian villa, which can cost a guest up to $8,000 to attend.

But the expert planner said that expecting loved ones to dig that deep into their savings and use their limited time off often leads to animosity and even dread — so she often advises clients to think twice about destination weddings.

“Your friends and family should be so excited about your wedding. They should be chomping at the bit to go to this. You don’t want to create a feeling of fatigue and you don’t want to create a burden on them,” Forbes said.

“I think that’s what destination weddings can really do.”

Forbes even had a client get pushback from her California-based loved ones after a majority declined to attend her nuptials in upstate New York, so she advised the bride to shift the ceremony to her hometown.

The move may have been in her best interest as Forbes has seen lots of regret after the honeymoon phase.

“I’ve heard from friends of mine who are brides, and other brides, that a year down the line, six months after, they do have that feeling of buyer’s remorse — of wanting to have a wedding, either at home or at a venue that’s familiar.”

Now Narvaez, who is in the planning stages of her own nuptials, is taking her guest experiences into account for her wedding, which will likely be a local one.

“I would really like to make it an easy choice for people to come or not come,” she said.