As if the process of choosing an aesthetically beautiful engagement ring for your fiancée wasn’t complicated enough, locating and selecting affordable engagement rings for women seems to be harder and harder. As brick-and-mortar stores continue to shrink their local inventory, online ring shopping is becoming more and more popular, especially because of how quickly you can browse multiple stores’ offerings. What many shoppers don’t realize is that shopping online also makes finding affordable engagement rings for women much easier! Without further ado, here is a guide that will help you choose a ring for your beloved wife-to-be:
1. Think Carefully about Metal Type
No precious metal is truly inexpensive, especially with consideration of the fact that lasting jewelry requires higher grades of metal. However, choosing a metal type wisely can still be a great way of making your jewelry affordable. For example, in recent years, platinum has become a popular metal for all kinds of jewelry. Believe it or not, though, platinum is actually considerably more expensive than gold in general. A platinum ring of the same style and size as a gold one will be noticeably more expensive. So if you are looking for the cool white sheen of platinum, but don’t want to pay the enormous cost, consider white gold. White gold is more expensive than yellow gold, but not nearly as expensive as platinum. Choosing a metal type wisely based on your stylistic desires makes a big difference!
2. Get the Size Right the First Time
While many jewelers offer a free resizing initially for engagement rings, there is still often a cost associated with shipping the ring back to the seller. For resizes after the initial purchase, the cost can be shocking. The price is especially high for rings with multiple gems, thicker bands, or higher-grade metals.Try to make sure you get the size right in the first place, and your overall cost of ring will be much more reasonable.
3. Use Jeweler Competition to Your Advantage
Different online jewelers are going to have varying prices, even among their offerings of affordable engagement rings for women. Use their competition for your business to your advantage. Jewelers want you to buy from them, and many will be willing to price match or negotiate prices if a competitor has a better price on a similar design. If there is a jeweler you greatly prefer, or a specific design that is offered by one jeweler but not another, you might be able to open up discussions with their sales representatives about coming to a better price that fits your personal needs.
4. Finance Carefully
An underappreciated portion of ring costs is the financing often involved. The simple truth of buying engagement rings is that most people don’t have thousands of dollars in cash on hand for a ring. Because of that fact, most people will enter into some type of financing engagement with their jeweler of choice. Be sure to consider carefully what financing you choose, though, because additional costs add up quickly with high interest rates. Even a few percentage points in interest rate can mean the difference of hundreds of dollars over a year of payments. Be thorough with your research and don’t sign anything until you are confident in the agreement.
Following these four tips will make sure you can feel confident that you are getting the most affordable ring you can without sacrificing the quality your fiancée deserves.
Want peace of mind in your selection? Come see our inventory and email us right away at info@oliviaewing.com!