A fine engagement ring is not an expense

The cultural framing around engagement ring spending is confused. On one side, there is the “two months’ salary” rule — a figure invented by De Beers in the 1980s to sell more diamonds, with no logical basis whatsoever. On the other, there is the counter-reaction: that any significant spending on a ring is a waste, a vanity, an asset that immediately loses value the moment you leave the shop.

Both framings are wrong, and both make thoughtful decision-making harder. Here is a cleaner way to think about it.

What you are actually buying

When you commission a well-made engagement ring, you are buying an object that will be worn daily for decades. Most of the cost is in the stone — which holds its value reasonably well and, in the case of natural diamonds in common grades, has historically tracked inflation. The remaining cost covers metal, craft, and design, which are consumed in the making of the object and have no resale value, but produce the object that your partner will wear for the next fifty years.

Measured this way, the cost per day of owning and wearing a €5,000 ring over twenty years is approximately €0.68. This is not the way most people think about luxury purchases, but it is a useful corrective to the anxiety that attaches to the initial number.

The comparison class that matters

The relevant comparison for an engagement ring is not other jewellery purchases. It is other significant objects that are used and valued over many decades — a quality watch, a fine piece of furniture, a musical instrument. None of these are “investments” in any financial sense; they are things that hold meaning and give pleasure over a sustained period. The economic logic of buying something well-made rather than something disposable applies to all of them.

A ring made with good materials and correct craftsmanship will look, in twenty years, essentially as it did the day it was made. A ring made with compromised materials or production shortcuts will show its provenance clearly over time — worn, marked, a stone that no longer sits perfectly. The difference is not subtle in the long run.

What spending more buys, specifically

At the level Rauno Oidram works at, spending more primarily buys better stone quality and original design. It does not buy a larger box, a better-known name, or a more elaborate shopping experience. It buys a better object.

Whether that matters depends on your partner. Some people care deeply about the quality of the thing itself. Others genuinely do not notice, and a €1,500 ring from a platform will serve them as well as a €7,000 commission would. Neither position is wrong. What is worth being clear about is which position describes your partner specifically, not which one is socially acceptable to hold.

The one thing I would push back on

The framing of ring spending as “just an expense” treats the object as pure cost with no value remaining after purchase. This ignores the stone, which does not depreciate in the way a car does; the craft, which produces something durable; and the meaning, which is not reducible to economics at all. A ring given at a meaningful moment carries that meaning forward. It is not nothing. It is not a ticket stub.

Spend what you can afford on something made correctly. Do not spend what you cannot afford in pursuit of a number someone else defined for you.

For a precise breakdown of what each euro in a ring’s price represents, read What you’re actually paying for in a €5,000 engagement ring. For guidance on how to think about the different tiers of the market, see Why a signature designer, instead of Tiffany.