Haines City man provides free weddings for homeless couples

It can cost a fortune to have a wedding. The hall, the flowers, the gown and tux, not to mention the food.

Lynette and Steve Hudson just tied the knot and had their wedding essentially for free. "It was fairly tale," Lynette told FOX 13. "It was beautiful."

And done right, according to one of the guests, Cynthia Malvita."We had filet mignon, lobster, potatoes. There were some vegetables," she recalled. "And wedding cake, of course!"

The event cost $3,500, money that the Hudsons didn't have. They're homeless. So the place they're staying in Haines City, now called "America's First Homeless Resort," picked up the tab.

"It comes from our money, the money that we make selling our newspaper, or by the transition fees, people pay for the hotel, or in this case, I'm giving $500 towards it as a donation," said Sean Cononie, who founded and runs the place.

Cononie has performed more than three dozen homeless weddings while he was operating shelters on Florida's East Coast.

Recently, the City of Hollywood paid Cononie $5 million. Half was to buy the shelters and other facilities he owned there. The rest was for him to promise that he would not go back to Hollywood for the next 30 years.