[jimhefferon]

Serious answer: have you discussed it with her? If you have talked it over and the major purchase of the engagement ring is something the two of you want to do then great, go for it. But it may be that the right decision for you is to think about alternate uses for the money.

Deciding to get married is wonderful. Congratulations! But sometimes people have a mental image of the sitcom scene where the one partner astounds the other by suddenly getting on one knee and plunking $30K on their hand. On reflection, that may not be the right way for people to start their life together, is all I'm saying.

[downerending]

I did the ring/knee thing once. In retrospect, was a mistake.

A true life partner will want to choose their own ring, and in particular, will want to think rationally about all of the other things you could do together with that money.

[verroq]

If I may interject, discussing potential surprises like this will kill the mood and ruin your big reveal later. So unless you’re sure your partner will take it well, I suggest not discussing things like this do just do as you please.

Some other friendly tips: you can secretly measure your partner’s finger size to get the perfect ring without them suspecting.

Going through the effort of getting the ring and sizing it properly without them suspecting shows how much you care and will yield you a better outcome than discussing this matter directly with them ;)

Edit: this is obviously with the assumption that you’ve at decided to get married. The surprise is about the ring not the marriage.

[citizenkeen]

I would strongly advise against proposing in 2020 to someone you haven't discussed the prospects of marriage with.

It can be a romantic outing in and of itself. I took my wife ring shopping to a half dozen stores in a beautiful fall afternoon. We didn't but anything, that was never the plan. I just wanted to see what rings made her face light up, then I made a much cheaper purchase on my own time.

[srinivgp]

If I may interject, no surprise with stakes that high is actually worth the downside risk. Just communicate. Unless you're sure your partner would have agreed that the surprise was worth not communicating, I suggest discussing things like this.

[verroq]

If they have decided to take your hand in marriage then I doubt they'd mind your choice of a ring.

[klyrs]

Some care. I'd be pissed if my partner blew 30k on a few grams of carbon that frankly looks like cut glass unless you shove your face into it. I'd rather be handed a box with a loop of string, a symbolic offer to go ring shopping together.

[MandieD]

All of this - I’m very glad my husband did not surprise me with two months’ salary worth of ring.

[sukilot]

Half the population of any neighborhood is women. You don't need to speculate about this. Ask a few.

[DavidVoid]

The general advice that I've heard (and which I agree with) is that when you propose should be the big surprise/reveal, not that you're proposing.

It seems to be best if both partners have discussed and agreed on marriage prior to the actual proposal, and it would then make sense to also have discussed the kind of ring (or price class of ring at least) that they would want.

Exactly what ring you get can be a surprise of course, but I think the price tag should be somewhat known beforehand.

[jimhefferon]

I guess so, but your idea of a proposal is different than mine. If the partners have discussed and agreed to get married then I'd say the proposal has already passed. But whatever makes folks happy is OK with me.

[DavidVoid]

The pre-proposal discussion is probably more of a "think we should get married someday?" kind of thing, the actual proposal (and consequent concrete plans to get married) might not be until months/years later.

[sukilot]

You should ask your married friends what a proposal is, and how ring shopping works, before you find yourself making an embarassing mistake.

[jimhefferon]

> You should ask your married friends what a proposal is

If by "you" you mean me, I've been married since 86. (I understand that you may have meant a generic "you.")

FWIW, we didn't buy a ring. I can't say we took that money and put it to use X but in the first years of marriage we certainly had some months where we were only able to pay bills by looking under the couch cushions for quarters, so I think it was a sound direction, for us.

[MandieD]

I was proposed to via mindmap, essentially. Only fly in the ointment was that, as a German, he didn’t realize that greeting me with “we need to talk” set my mind in a completely different direction, but aside from that, seeing his thinking behind his long-term hopes for our relationship was quite romantic.

Looking for the stone together was entertaining after I was able to get him to understand that I really, really didn’t expect him to spend the “two months' salary” that is “customary” in my home country (USA).

If you want the romantic surprise, arrange a nice, private dinner (or other private special occasion) and get a silver CZ ring to present as a placeholder for the ring she’s going to help you pick out, making it clear that it’s a placeholder. If this does not go over well, better to find this out about her before making a big legal commitment!

[sukilot]

Did you get a diamond? If so, How do you justify to yourself that a diamond is moral, ethical, or practical choice?

[jimhefferon]

Nice story!