Renovating a kitchen

We have saved for several years to renovate our kitchen so we could pay cash for it. It was so etching my wife wanted, it was all fine with me, and it would hopefully make it easier to sell the house at some point in time.

The project started as putting in granite counters and adding 3 pull out drawers in an open space under the island. Well each day something got added, such as taking 3 shelves out of the other side of the island and putting in drawers. Then a small narrow 2 shelf area next to the stove became a pull out drawer with 3 shelves for spices and all kinds of oils. Of course with granite it was a new sink and new faucet....after it was in my wife says she hopes she didn't make a mistake in the style she picked out and I told her too late now as granite had to be cut for what she wanted.

We needed a new refrigerator since ours us 23.5 yrs old, still works and will go in the garage, but looks awful. Well the contractor, a good friend, says "you can't have a stainless refrig and the rest of the appliances white" so we now have a new stove, microwave, dishwasher, refrig.

With new drawers that means we had to have handles to pull them out, which means all new handles and hinges on all cabinets.

Also have the kitchen walls and ceilings painted. Needed the new wood stained and the painter says the new wood will look new and shiny but the cabinets while in great shape will look dull, so all wood is being redone

I felt like I was on the show property brothers where things and $$$$$ were changing daily if not hourly

And one last thing, if you think you know what's in you kitchen you have no idea. Trust me. When you have to take it all out, you better get a big garbage can and start throwing away. Our dining room table, floor, living room floor and coffee table, office floor, two card tables are all full. And that doesn't count things in the cabinets we didn't have to move, just what was on top and those shelves and this glass standing shelf thing we have

Throw in how many dinners I have had to buy and bring home, I am broke. Thank goodness I didn't have to bring cattails down here for the painting or me banker would have given Carl a trip to Vegas to play golf

Don't renovate guys, resist your wife as hard as you can, a few nights in the guest room will be fine

I feel your pain! We redid our kitchen when we sold our house a few years ago. What I thought would be a week-long project took about a month and cost double what we thought it would.

We've had issues with our GE appliances, but I'm reluctant to replace them because I'm worried about what it will end up costing and how long it will take.

We renovated our kitchen and 3 baths when we lived in Ohio. I'm convinced the master bath renovation is what resulted in our house selling in 5 days. Jeeepcat was extremely helpful as he gave me a great deal of advice. Thanks, Shaun!

My wife started talking about renovating so I went shopping for a different house that someone else had already renovated. She really likes the new house

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Originally Posted by dan_bgblue

My wife started talking about renovating so I went shopping for a different house that someone else had already renovated. She really likes the new house

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Cheaper. And a lot less headache!

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Originally Posted by dan_bgblue

My wife started talking about renovating so I went shopping for a different house that someone else had already renovated. She really likes the new house

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Smart man

I know the feeling. We did our kitchen 2 years ago when a gas leak resulted in a explosion that nearly blew me up. Final cost was close to $70,000 by the time all the "changes" got done.

Now we need to redo the master bedroom and master bath. Got a leak in the roof over the bath and a mold issue in the bedroom causing the floor to warp. Waiting for the bad tax news to find out what the budget will be. Hopefully won't be as bad because we won't have the appliances that we did in the kitchen.

I am perfectly miserable reading this thread. I have two baths that need renovation, one major. Previous owner replaced the pan in the shower, removed the tiles and replaced them when the pan was complete. It looks as though I had done the tile work. Uneven, grout missing, grout colors don't exactly match. It's a large shower, fully enclosed with tile, all sides and ceiling. It is so dark that if you don't shower in the middle of the day you can hardly see. Previous owner smoked and stained all of the tile and marble around the sink. Wall over the sink and wall over the oversize tub are solid mirrors. Hard to look at my naked body every morning from every angle. Hellava way to start your day. I'm not sure what would cost more, fixing the mirrors or fixing the body. I guess the mirrors will go.

Renovation horror stories are why I do the bulk of my own work.

A potential deadly combination is a wife, a contractor and credit cards.

Mick, I hate to say this but some friends of ours are redoing their bathroom..he is a dentist so he can afford it..and they told us it is going to cost between $20-$25,000. When we got home I told my wife I can't imagine spending that much on a bathroom.

Now the rest of my story on the kitchen.

Last monday they finally delivered the new refrigerator. When they unplugged the old one sparks flew out of the water line and the kitchen lights went out. So upstairs I go and two breakers were off so I flipped them on and back down I went. So one set of lights are on but dim and the lights over the table are not on. Back upstairs, turn off the breakers and back on, sparks fly out of one breaker.

So I turn them off and call a friend who is a electrician but only does service work. He comes and spend 2.5 hours trying to figure it out. We went in the garage to see if anything was off there, push the button for the garage opener and bang, and smoke, Burns up.

After the 2.5 hours he says it is above him and can't figure it out so I can the contractor who did the inside and he gave me his electrician that wires his houses. Guy agrees to come because of emergency. He spends 1.5 hours trying to figure it out and says he hasn't ever seen anything like it, my house is making electricy. Some lights are so bright they blind you, and some outlets had 190 volts coming through. Turn on the ceiling fan switch and it comes on, flip it off and a lamp comes on. So he decides along with my friend that is has to be the transformer and for me to call the electric company. And he says don't let them claim it isn't them and blow smoke up my butt. Before he leaves he tells me he is turning all breakers off as he doesn't want house to burn up.

So I call the electic company and they have a truck there in 45 min and of course he claims it isn't their transformer and is somewhat a butt. So I tell him I am calling my electrician so they can talk through it. Well, he decides to check one more thing. :) While he is at the transformer which happens to be on the corner of my lot I went out to see what he is going. With the lid up, the whole inside in covered in an ant bed. First I ask if that is the trouble and he says maybe. And then I ask how often they come around and clean these things out and his reply is they don't have time. BS. And he says he needs to call another truck in...now I know its their problem

So second truck shows up and out I go again, in cold and misting rain with my walking boot on my bad foot. Second guy says yep its their problem and asks if my neighbor was having any electical problems and of course I have no idea. He says well if they haven't they were about to. seems the ants ate the wear to my house in two, big as my finger and the one to my neighbors house was eaten about in half. then he says I am lucky it wasn't the summer because when the AC kicked on it probably burns the house down.

So when the wire is fixed he tells me to turn the breakers on, and everything looked normal.
TV didn't work but thankfully it was the surge protector. Of course I know the garage door opener if friend, now I find out my brand new microwave is friend, as is the exhaust fan in the downstairs bathroom, the tv in the spare bedroom and my wifes clock radio CD player.

Garage door opener, $415, new microwave $375, plus TV and exhaust.

State Farm has a new deductible policy, 5% of the value of your house and contents, won't cover my loss because I don't get to deductible :(

I have a call in to the electric company wanting them to pay for everything, it will be a fight I know. But since their employees told me they don't have time to maintain their transformer and they told me I was lucky their transformer didn't burn my house down, it should be an interesting conversation.

They started my masterbath and bedroom today. also quotes on the roof. Guess we are going metal roof over repairing the 20 year old shake roof or replacing with shingle roof. Figure a 20 year old shake roof is, well a 20 year old shake roof which is about 6 years longer than it should have lasted and if we sell the house in 3-5 years we are going to get "negotiated" out of 30-40K on the price as the buyers will want us to pay for a new roof. Replacing the roof with shingles vs metal, metal is 25% more but gets you a better/quicker resale here. I figure that 25% is going to be 10 grand so can I make that up on the sale price or on how quickly I can sell it and/or the decreased maintenance/insurance before I sell the home? Plus my wife prefers the metal, I prefer the shingle but of course my preference doesn't matter.


Kitchens are fun. Never stay in budget so forget about that! I think our kitchen was close to 70K when all was said and done (3 years ago). Of course that was when my wife tried to blow me up with the gas stove. Literally blew the island apart with me in the kitchen. Blew the vents out of the ceiling from the fireball. Plus we knocked out a couple walls, etc... Heck, this morning, meeting with the contractor, our bathroom budget went up a couple grand....LOL

blew you up, huh. LOL

My kitchen was cheap then. Painted the walls, two coats of paint on the ceiling, all new appliances, new back slash with glass design, new drawers, changed out shelves with drawers, all new wood on island which is a double island, all new granite, new sink, new faucet, new kitchen lights (2), sanded and restained all the other wood and cabinets, new handles and draw pulls...$11,000

Got one estimate for the roof today. $36,000. Made me happy as I was expecting 40,000 minimum.

On the kitchen, yeah, she blew it up. Left the stove top on and the fan blew out the burner. An hour later I noted the stove top dial wasn't off so I turned it off. It sparked and ignited all the gas that had accumulated under the stovetop in the cabinet. It literally lifted the granite counter top and blew the island apart. Burnt all the hair off my chest since I was in front of the stove top. Probably a 10 foot fireball�� Scariest damn thing in my life. Then my wife yelled at me ask why did I try to blow up the kitchen (she had gone to bed so it was my fault). Swear on my grave that is the honest to God truth. Ask her next time you see her. She will verify it

Oh, my.

I'm buying a tent.

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Originally Posted by Darrell KSR

Oh, my.

I'm buying a tent.

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Darrell I thought I was living one of your life stories :)

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Originally Posted by jazyd

Darrell I thought I was living one of your life stories :)

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Lol. You guys are just scaring me with your renovation horror stories.

This thread is horrifying.

Bathroom flooring question: better choice-marble, ceramic tile or Porcelain tile? Pros and Cons of each. Obviously Marble the most expensive and has the highest resale but I'm not sure its the way we want to go. We want a contemporary look and the tile seems to fit the bill but do we go ceramic or porcelain?

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Originally Posted by Doc

Bathroom flooring question: better choice-marble, ceramic tile or Porcelain tile? Pros and Cons of each. Obviously Marble the most expensive and has the highest resale but I'm not sure its the way we want to go. We want a contemporary look and the tile seems to fit the bill but do we go ceramic or porcelain?

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I love travertine. Timeless rich look. Will add significantly to your resale value.

Ceramic is good, but it's a trick to pick something that is current, attractive to buyers, but won't look dated. Ceramic color is a surface thing. Drop something heavy and you will have a different color showing where the chip came off.

Porcelain is a better version of ceramic as it is somewhat inherently non slip, and the color goes all the way through the tile.

We have travertine throughout the house (Kitchen, halls, living room, dining room) and I hate it. Have to have it polished and sealed every 6 months and it still looks like crap.

I think we are going with Porcelain.