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Not This Girl’s Best Friend…
We’re selling my engagement ring tomorrow. I have to work, but my husband is going to drive to the Shane Company and meet a couple who are buying it from us. He’ll walk away with $1150, and they’ll get the ring. We’re both happy to be selling it, although when we posted it on Craig’s List earlier this week, we noticed that almost all the rings for sale were because of a broken engagement or a divorce. There were very few happy stories.
We bought the ring 4 years ago, for $2000. At the time, we knew that we were “supposed” to get a diamond, and we had the money left over after we paid the down payment on our house. So we were thrilled to go to the Shane Company and pick out a ring. I still think it’s one of the prettiest rings I’ve ever seen. That ring was about the only traditional thing about our wedding. Over the last few years, we’ve talked about how silly we were to spend $2000 on a piece of jewelery. And yes, I know some people spend ten times that - don’t even get me started on how absurd I think that is. We both felt that we could have spent the money on much better things - things that would actually make a difference in our lives and future. Diamonds are only valuable because the people at De Beers have convinced us that only a diamond can signify true love, and that spending thousands of dollars for a rock is an essential part of getting engaged. And yet diamonds don’t make marriages stronger. Just look on Craig’s List under engagement rings and see how much money some people spent on rings that they are selling because the relationship has fallen apart. And there’s also the complete exploitation of workers in southern Africa who mine diamonds… trust me, none of them will ever be able to afford a diamond ring.
So a couple years ago, we tossed around the idea of selling the ring. We talked about it every now and again, but never did anything about it. Then last weekend, during a ten mile run with our dog, I decided that I was ready to sell it. The notion that the ring signifies our love or has any meaning in our relationship is ridiculous. I do not know any couple with a stronger partnership than we have. We are each other’s best friend, we share the same hopes and goals and ideology. After six years, we still spend every evening and weekend together. We take very good care of each other, and will continue to do so for the rest of our lives. Of that I am as certain as I am that the earth is round. A diamond (or lack of one) has nothing to do with our marriage.
So now we’re going to do what we wish we had done four years ago - we’re buying a cubic zirconia. This is not as easy as you would think - most cz rings are super cheap, the sort that turn fingers green. But we found a company that sells high quality synthetic diamonds, set in real gold rings. I found a ring I love, and it’s $200. That’s more like it. If no one can tell without lab testing whether a diamond is real or not, why would I care which one is on my finger?
So when all is said and done, we’ll have $950 left over, which we’ll split between our HSA and a new Roth IRA that I’m setting up next week. We both think that’s a much better use of the money than having it sitting on my finger.
Wow, That is a great story. So cool you can part with something like that and find completeness in something that many other would feel ‘isn’t the same thing’
Good for you!
April 15th, 2007 at 12:27 am
[...] My husband went to the Shane Company yesterday to meet the people who were buying our ring. They had a few different rings that they had bought from other people - all Shane Co originals. They were trading them in for credit towards the ring set they were buying. (huge, with tons of diamonds - a bit tacky, but if that’s what you like, they sure were resourceful about how they were paying for it). Shane Co will allow you to trade in your ring at any time, for the price that you paid for it, as long as you use the money as credit towards a more expensive ring. So this couple paid us $1150, then gave the ring back to Shane Co and got a $2000 credit towards their own ring. And they did this with a few other rings as well, so they probably saved a few thousand dollars on the ring they were buying. Quite creative, and if you really feel that you gotta have a real diamond, this is a pretty frugal way to go about it. [...]
April 15th, 2007 at 5:38 pm
Thank Dawn!
April 15th, 2007 at 5:39 pm
My favorite thing about this story is that you are not considering that the decision was made irrevocably. You’re simply making the decision over again in a different way now that your priorities have gotten clearer. Good move!
April 16th, 2007 at 12:54 am
[...] Frugal Babe writes about selling her engagement ring. This is a POWERFUL POST. Great job! [...]
April 17th, 2007 at 1:44 pm
[...] Frugal Babe has an incredible post up about selling her engagement ring. I hear ya and completely agree Frugal Babe! [...]
April 17th, 2007 at 7:27 pm
[...] Frugal Babe (and her husband) decides to sell her engagement ring, even though she’s happily married. [...]
April 18th, 2007 at 3:11 am
perfect
:) My hunny said it took him a long time to get my ring. He said he would NOT leave the arcade without it and it almost cost him the ENTIRE roll of quarters. LOL 
I loved this post. So glad to hear you’re finding better ways to invest your cash. How cool is that
April 18th, 2007 at 5:08 am
[...] Frugal Babe, who has a really gorgeous blog design if you ask me, writes about selling her engagement ring, THOUGH SHE’S HAPPILY MARRIED. This is by far the best post of all. Every crazy girl into bling ought to read this post. I am however a little disappointed that she’s still going to wear something shiny. I say go with the plain band. But she does have a pretty cool alternative in mind. [...]
April 18th, 2007 at 1:42 pm
Amazing. That is really cool! I’m glad you are detaching from a silly materalistic symbol and know the true value of your marriage.
April 18th, 2007 at 1:43 pm
Wow. Great story. When I gave my wife her ring, it was as a show of dedication. It was a lot of money at the time, but not as much now. I can’t imagine her finger without it!
April 18th, 2007 at 3:35 pm
Hey mapgirl, thanks for the kudos. I did think about just not having anything shiny at all, but I always liked how my ring looked… I wasn’t sure if it was hypocritical to sell the diamond and then turn around and buy something else that looked like a diamond, but then I decided that I didn’t care
I love what the new ring looks like, and the money from the old one is in a Roth IRA right now, so I’m a happy camper.
April 18th, 2007 at 3:58 pm
What a great idea! In my first marriage, even though I was young, I knew it was dumb to spend all that money on a diamond, so I bought a sapphire and got a lot of compliments on it. Basil and I have been together almost 10 years, and have decided that since I have kids that are applying for financial aid for college (single mom = more aid), we’ll hold off a few more years before getting married. But when we do, you can be sure we’ll be spending the ring money on a fantastic honeymoon and not a diamond.
April 18th, 2007 at 4:30 pm
My fiance and I skipped the engagaement ring altogether. We’re planning our wedding for this fall and I am ringless. It’s funny how people immediately glance down at your finger when you tell them you’re getting married. The puzzled looks on their faces at my nakes hand are even funnier. I just couldn’t ask my guy to spend all that money on a ring when there was so much else we needed and I wanted.
April 18th, 2007 at 5:11 pm
[...] Frugal Babe is selling her engagement ring for frugality reasons. That’s some dedication to frugality. Not that material things are everything… [...]
April 18th, 2007 at 5:44 pm
I agree with you 100%. You are smarter than the average bear to have reached these conclusions. I almost wish I could have married you.
I hate to get technical with you, but the earth isn’t round. It has a huge equatorial bulge.
April 18th, 2007 at 9:04 pm
Turns out, my wedding band cost more than my wife’s… only because I have a bigger ring finger than she does!
(We ended up eloping)
April 19th, 2007 at 1:15 am
I didn’t have a ring. Not once in the 25+ years we’ve been married have we even thought of getting one.
April 20th, 2007 at 10:20 pm
[...] I opened a Roth IRA this week, using $500 of the money we got from my ring. I have my account at TD Ameritrade, which is where my traditional IRA is as well. When we set up our traditional IRAs with them, we each bought into an index fund, and then had our automatic contributions sent to that same fund each month. There was a $50 fee to buy each index fund upfront, but then we were able to contribute each month with no additional fee. [...]
April 21st, 2007 at 12:16 am
Great story! I’m somewhat inclined to lose things so my husband & I discuss CZs when I got married. Didn’t happen because it turned out he (& each of his brothers) had inherited a diamond. Only warning I got was that the corners on the CZ wear a little more than than real diamonds - wouldn’t have mattered to me since most of the time mine seems to be covered in a film of dirt from the garden.
April 22nd, 2007 at 11:14 am
What company did you find that sells nice CZ rings?
April 25th, 2007 at 2:14 pm
Diamond Nexus Labs is the name of the company. You can check them out at DiamondNexusLabs.com and see what you think. My ring hasn’t arrived yet - I’ll post about it when it does. But I have high hopes that it will be good
April 25th, 2007 at 3:20 pm
[...] Yay! My new ring arrived yesterday! We were both very excited when the DHL guy showed up. The box was huge - they padded it well. The actual presentation of the ring was great. They had a white box tied with ribbon, and inside it were two smaller boxes, also tied with ribbon. One box had two chocolates in it (aw, how sweet!) and the other had a beautiful wooden ring box, with my new ring inside. It’s perfect, except that I ordered the wrong size. So sad, cause I had to send it back to get re-sized, so I only wore it for one day so far. Before I ordered the ring, I measured my finger with a piece of string, using a ring size gauge I found on line. But I guess I was off a bit - it doesn’t take much, since the sizes are only a couple mm from each other. Anyway, I ordered a 5.5, and it was flopping around all over my finger. I called the company to see about resizing, and they suggested that I go to a jeweler to get my finger sized, since they only do one free resizing. So this morning I went over to the Shane Company, and they said I’m a 4.5 - good thing I didn’t just send the ring back and ask them to take it down to a 5 (that’s what I had planned to do before the guy said I should go get sized by someone who knows what they’re doing). I guess I have really skinny (bony?) fingers. [...]
May 2nd, 2007 at 5:36 am
you wouldn’t happen to be dave ramsey listeners? would you?
May 2nd, 2007 at 8:46 am
[...] calculated our net worth for a few months, but I knew it was going in the right direction. Selling my ring and the gift from my parents helped a lot over the last couple months. Our net worth right now is [...]
May 13th, 2007 at 5:41 pm
[...] 4 or 5 cts. She was a very pleasant lady, and obviously a diamond connoisseur. She noticed my new ring and said how beautiful it was. She said that she could tell that it was a very high quality stone [...]
May 18th, 2007 at 3:47 am
[...] Babe (and her husband) decides to sell her engagement ring, even though she’s happily [...]
May 28th, 2007 at 11:09 pm
[...] been wearing my new ringfor a month now, and I absolutely love it. I think it’s even prettier than the [...]
June 13th, 2007 at 9:09 pm
[...] sold her diamond engagement ring to raise cash, and replaced it with a cubic zirconia [...]
July 20th, 2007 at 2:42 pm
Well done you. Having read a lot about the diamond industry I’d rather have fake anyday!
July 6th, 2008 at 7:18 am
I’m impressed that you and your husband decided to do this. Good for you! When my hubby and I got engaged, we didn’t do the engagement ring thing, because it just seemed like such a waste of money. (Besides, I don’t really like the whole engagement ring tradition anyway…the woman wears a ring signaling that she belongs to her fiance, but the man is still free and clear until the wedding bands show up). For our wedding bands, we ordered recycled gold bands from the wonderful, socially- and eco-conscious company Green Karat. They’re perfect.
August 20th, 2008 at 9:35 am
[...] ring bling. If you’ve been reading my blog for a while, you probably already know that we sold my engagement ring last year, put the money in our HSA, and bought a man-made diamond ring for $230. Absolutely one of our [...]
November 2nd, 2008 at 12:52 pm
Completely agree. I’ve always said that I would prefer a pretty stone other than a diamond. I have a friend who is an aid worker - used to work in Sierra Leone and is now working in other parts of West Africa. His stories more than convinced me that diamonds are not worth the blood of other people. Diamonds funded the terrible war in Sierra Leone and even now it is hard to ensure that you are not buying blood diamonds. Even “polar bear diamonds” (mined in Canada) are not totally ethical becuase of land disputes with our Aboriginal peoples. But even beyond that point, why should something as arbitrary as a stone be a necessary symbol of love? I’m glad you are getting something you are more comfortable with. Btw - I got a good quality CZ on a necklace, on sale at the Bay. It has even fooled the “diamond people” at Peoples Jewellers.
November 4th, 2008 at 3:10 pm