Engagement rings featuring beautiful, brilliant center stones are always in vogue. Being the most popular ring design, this is also one of the most expensive ones in the engagement ring market. Let us take a sneak peek at some useful hacks that might help you save some money while getting you the design your heart desires!
Working With The 4Cs
If you want a bigger stone as the center stone, at a fixed budget, you may find great deals if you are willing to compromise on the color and clarity scales of the stones. This is especially true for brilliant cuts since they are the most expensive and the most sought-after stones in the engagement ring market. Instead of a stone with no visible inclusions in clear or white color, if you choose to go with stones of the same carat in excellent cut with slight inclusions and tints, you may save a lot of money.
These inclusions are usually not visible to the naked eye and would not considerably affect the brilliance of the stone. The same goes for the color. Tints that are unrecognizable to the average buyer are assured to cause no depreciation in the appearance of the stone. You might actually be surprised at the slashed price tag of the finished product once you have made such minor compromises on the 4Cs, without compromising on the size and appearance of the stones.
Shapes And Settings
Some diamond shapes and settings tend to be on the pricier end of the spectrum; the best example being the brilliant cut round solitaire diamond. Ironically, this is the most popular design in the segment. If you are up to experimenting with different shapes and settings of stones in your engagement rings, you might end up getting a better deal at a much lower price. For example, if you choose a pear shaped diamond in a three prong setting, you would save a lot of money when compared to the round solitaire and would have a stone that would appear bigger in size when compared to the round shape in the same carat.
No matter the design and cost considerations you might have about your precious engagement ring, slight compromises and adjustments in various aspects such as the stone quality, the design and purchase cost would help you get an affordable ring with an aesthetically pleasing design.