Yup, little lady of almost 34 years wants to redo our kitchen.
1. Have you priced out quartz countertops?
2. Have you priced out a microwave drawer?
3. Have you priced out a double oven?
4. These aren't $119 hood vents any more
The price of a "happy wife" is more than I thought.
I just built an entire house; believe me, I know.
While the upfront cost of a remodel may very well be higher than an amicable divorce, the long term return on your investment is much better. Obviously you've never tried to get a hooker to toast you a bagel.
Plus you forgot she will want new cabinets after she thinks about it a little more. And maybe a new floor and dishwasher.
By the time you are done it will be turbo Subaru money.
Do you cook? Or does at least someone cook every day?
The kitchen is itself a tool.
Would you want to use a Harbor Freight kitchen every day?
I wouldn't.
Working on some remodeling at home now. I'm convinced it would have been cheaper to buy a different house with nicer things.
Did this two years ago. We ditched the double oven idea quickly after seeing the cost. We got a 36" stove and a big countertop toaster oven. Does everything we need. The 36" stove was a kick in the pants cost wise, but damned if it isn't the answer given the size of our family and how we cook daily.
We got granite countertops from a local Russian guy who cut us a deal if we also did the bathroom counters. Again, it was a kick in the pants over a normal countertop but damn it looks good.
Our microwave sits in an open hole in the cabinets with its own outlet. Weird flex, but it works.
Amazon is your friend for hood vents. We needed a beast of a range hood to accompany our stove. Local "home decor" places wanted almost a grand for one. I snagged one off Amazon for less than $300, works great. But I also snagged a $70 range hood for a 30" stove at our rental unit on Amazon, so deals are out there.
My wife absolutely loves our new kitchen. She shows it off to her friends and they are always in awe. She loves cooking in it. I'll be paying it off for decades, but it has been worth it so far.
IKEA quartz countertops were much less than the other places I checked. 2 years later all is still well with them
1.) Quartz? Lets just roll on some diamonds.
2.) Stay away from the drawer, impossible to clean the roof.
3.) We're all getting older, you want a hot 20 lb. turkey with juice down your shirt?
4.) Buy a sheet metal brake.
It's not about the money, 
which choice would provide the most enjoyment and satisfaction?
And when she decides on what color cabinets, that decision lasts about 4 years
In reply to Datsun310Guy :
We did a rip out / re-do of our original 1962 kitchen coupled with a new 20 x 14 family room addition out where the back wall of the kitchen used to be 2 years ago. All of that was in there and it cost more than what we bought the house for in the early 90's. Now with material prices what they are, who knows? So, yeah I feel you bro...
I'll confess that it's the best thing we've ever done once the construction part was over. We looked at moving to get what we wanted and decided it was worth doing the project and staying put.
In reply to 11GTCS :
In 2010 we gut renovated our kitchen and added an approximately 10' x 18' laundry room extension. At that point we'd been in the house about 15 years.
Moving the laundry out of the kitchen and capturing an underutilized breakfast nook about tripled the usable kitchen space, or better. 2 people can now work together in it. The available storage is about triple as well, and much more convenient.
That work, plus windows and siding in the rest of the house, cost exactly as much as we paid for the house in 1995.
It was worth every penny and I've never regretted it for a minute.
In reply to Datsun310Guy :
If I can make one suggestion:
If you can make it work, find a place for a second small sink near the preparation area, away from the main dishwashing sink / dishwasher area. It doesn't need to be big - a bar sink would work fine. But being able to dump dirty utensils and pots in the main sink and still rinse vegetables or hands right where you're cooking makes it SO much easier to work. Best single move I made in redesigning our space.
All kidding aside I'm all for the change. We are in the kitchen every day and totally believe in keeping your house up as time goes on. I'll do what I can cause she is my sweetheart.
This is before - I'll get you an after someday.
Reminds me that I am about to enter the 29th year of procrastinating about re-doing the kitchen. Nobody has starved.
ultraclyde (Forum Supporter) said:...Obviously you've never tried to get a hooker to toast you a bagel.
Is that what the kids are calling it these days?
In reply to Duke :
We'd wanted to do it for years but 2 kids, education, etc... Just the daylight that the windows in the new addition let into the family room and kitchen was worth it in itself. The back of our house / addition is a western exposure so even this time of year the sun comes in almost all day, the old kitchen had the stove on the back wall (where the sink should have been so no window) and the sink up against the wet wall for the bathroom (because it was easy for the original builder). We had to have lights on in the kitchen even on the brightest days as the windows in the eating area did nothing for the rest of the old kitchen. Add the bonus of a professionally designed kitchen with all the storage, a real exhaust hood, counter space, well you understand. It was worth waiting until could afford to do it right. We'll be here 30 years this coming spring, not planning on going anywhere else at this point.
Datsun310Guy said:All kidding aside I'm all for the change. We are in the kitchen every day and totally believe in keeping your house up as time goes on. I'll do what I can cause she is my sweetheart.
This is before - I'll get you an after someday.
Now see that looks like a good "after" picture to me. The kitchen in my house in Delaware started with 1/8" wood paneling on the walls, mobile home grade counters and linoleum next to the stove, and kid you not, carpet through the rest of the kitchen:
Did *most* of the work myself, farmed out the counter and backsplash install. Kept the original cabinets and cleaned them up with woodsoap and new hardware. This was a budget job, but I think it turned out pretty nice:
Cost me too much time and sanity.
I've done kitchens in my last two houses. The first one was a nice update, the second was a transformation. Both were complete teardowns of all the cabinets, the second one also involved pulling a little stub wall. Did it all myself and don't regret it one bit. You spend more time in the kitchen than just about any other room in the house, especially if it's an open plan like ours have been.
Get thee to IKEA.
I liked their previous generation of cabinets better than their current ones, but they're still a killer value for the money. Their online design tool will make sure you have an accurate bill of materials and makes it much easier to plan. Some of the IKEA doors are solid wood, some are not - spend some time looking at what's out there. Their hardware (hinges and sliders) is awesome. Some people rag on IKEA because, well, it's not hand-hewn lumber or something but they're far more substantial than the 30-year-old cabinets I've yanked out of a couple of houses.
If you go IKEA, you can also build and install the cabinets yourself. It's a fairly quick process and you will save bulk dollars here. Then have someone else install the countertops. I recommend using wood glue along with the IKEA fasteners, it makes for a stronger box.
We went with a mix of drawers and cabinets for the base on our old one. On our new one, it's all drawers. A 36" wide drawer on heavy duty slides with a light is a really nice thing. On that note, soft-close and interior lighting is wonderful.
You can get butcher block slabs for countertops. The IKEA ones have changed, I'd probably go with the Home Depot options now. But it's a lot less expensive and easier to DIY than quartz. We have quartz in the new one, the last one was a mix.
Online is definitely the choice for fans. They all seem to come from Broan, but the better ones are a lot better than the cheap ones. Pay attention to sound ratings.
If you put a power outlet inside a cabinet, you can rig up a drawer with a multi-outlet USB power supply. Then you add chargers for all of your devices and now they have a place to live and charge where they're out of sight.
No pics of my redos at the moment, but I can supply them if desired.
Duke said:In reply to 11GTCS :
In 2010 we gut renovated our kitchen and added an approximately 10' x 18' laundry room extension. At that point we'd been in the house about 15 years.
We did almost the same thing in almost the same timeline, though no addition, but I added a handful of new circuits and replaced all the plumbing all the way back. I paid for custom cabinets and bought windows, but every thing else I did myself. It wasn't that expensive, and we've been enjoying it for 10 years now and it still looks good.
I recently saw a pic of the gutted kitchen and I wish I had that energy today.
Good stuff, wife wants to take out the island that we have now that is sorta bat shaped and make it a single 8 1/2ft piece to make better function for the stools. We need new countertops anyway so this is probably what we will go with. I think we can demo and fit the new cabinets around the stove and pay someone to fix the floor and do the countertops. She did want black granite but is now leaning towards white quartz.
About countertops - the last two times, I went through Lowes. They basically showed me samples and then had a third party do the install. But I did this because the 25 year warranty is with Lowes, not the small shop that did the work. 25 years from now, I'm more confident Lowes will be in business :)
Be ready for the countertops to take a while. I just lay down some plywood painted in roughly the same color as a temporary top. Actually helps SWMBO visualize the final result before you commit the big bucks. The countertop process can't start in earnest until the base cabs are down as they have to measure the actual kitchen.
This is why I love my wee little house. I redid the kitchen (not floors or appliances) for about $1200. My quartz countertops were something like $850.
The downside is trying to cook a big meal or entertain more than one other person for dinner. The upside is, that means I never have to host a family holiday meal.
Love that table/chair combo.
For us, the kitchen is a focal point. After all, every party is a kitchen party eventually. And both our current house and previous house had an open plan.
Before. Note that in the first picture, I'd already taken out a board from the ceiling. It's like they didn't want to see out the windows at...everything.
After (well, almost after). Double the pantry space, a much more open feel, an extra 6' of countertop thanks to a removed stub wall. That main countertop is something like 14x3.5 so it was not a cheap date. But doing the work myself paid for it.
I need to do a proper photo shoot of the end result one of these days. I have more before photos but no afters.
You'll need to log in to post.
