Archive for March, 2009

Discount Kitchen Cabinets vs. Kitchen Cabinet Refacing

A complete set of kitchen cabinets can start at around $800 at the bottom of the line for discount kitchen cabinets and go all the way up to $100,000 for a high quality set. To estimate the costs of your kitchen cabinets measure the length of the area that will have base cabinets, the ones that sit on the floor, and the length of the wall cabinets. Add these two numbers together and you have the number of lineal feet of required cabinets. If it is your intent to install a pantry or other cabinet that is floor to ceiling, include the length dimension in both the base and wall cabinet number.

Most home centers and kitchen cabinet specialty retailers will post an average lineal price for each design and quality. The price per lineal foot does not include the countertop or cabinet installation. The lineal foot price indicated is usually based on a 10-foot long, straight wall configuration, (no corner cabinets required or glass doors). It will not include any trim or cabinet options and in most cases will not include doorknobs, or drawer pulls. Unless specifically indicated the price will not include installation. As a rule of thumb, you can double the lineal foot price of the cabinets to arrive at the total cost of the project, installed. The lineal per foot cost is in the doors and hardware.

Doors can be made of veneered MDF or hardwoods that are richly stained. Luxury door hardware, such as hinges, knobs, and pulls can add as much as $50 to the price of a specific cabinet. Drawer slides are also an important price driver. Quality drawer slides make a major difference to the price of a cabinet. When you are shopping for your cabinets, pay special attention to the hardware that is used and fabrication techniques. Make sure you are comparing similar qualities when looking at best price.

Knowledge and planning are the keys to a successful home remodel project. Kitchen cabinets have an enormous spread in pricing from $80 a lineal foot for laminate faced, self-assembly to $300 a lineal foot for hardwood doors, glass insets, and ceiling trims. Because of this spread in price, it is important to set a top amount that you can afford. Then you consider the cabinet designs available up to that price point. If your cabinets are in good shape, or at least the frame is in good shape, and you like the configuration, consider replacing just the doors. Combined with a refinishing job on the frame, this option can give you a whole new look at a fraction of the cost of new cabinets. The choices are simple when it comes to doors: replace them completely, refinish your existing doors or do a combination of both.

Replacing your doors is quite self-explanatory; unless you have strangely designed custom-built doors, door sizes are standard and replacements will be easy to find at any good home renovation store or cabinet manufacturing company. Judge replacement doors just as you would the entire cabinets. Look for quality materials and excellent finishes.

Another option is kitchen cabinet refacing. kitchen cabinet refacing involves removing your kitchen cabinet doors and drawers and resurfacing them with wood or laminate veneer. The newly refaced doors and drawer fronts are then mounted using new hinges and pull. For the best look, the interior edges of the face frame should also be faced, or at least completely sanded and refinished. This process is much less expensive than replacing your kitchen cabinets, yet provides a fresh updated look.

The cost of having the average kitchen refaced by a professional kitchen cabinet refacing company can run between $2500-$5000 depending on the size, number and layout of the existing cabinets, and is considerably less than replacing the whole kitchen. Kitchen cabinet refacing can usually be done in about 3-5 work days.
Kitchen Improvements

A Simple Guide to Building Kitchen Cabinets

Building kitchen cabinets is certainly within the reach of most people, especially if they are of a regular size. Even though carcasses come in different sizes, they are all essentially built in exactly the same way, so once you have put the first couple together the rest should be a lot easier to manage.

But admitting your kitchen isn’t a regular square or rectangle shape? What if you have a sloping roof? Or an awkward recess? Or simply an irregular wall that needs to be hidden behind your kitchen cabinets?

In this case, building kitchen cabinets might not be as easy as you think. Proper preparation is required here to make sure the finished kitchen looks as good as it should. Here are some tips for making your ideal kitchen come true.

Building kitchen cabinets of an irregular shape needn’t be as hard as you think. In fact, in some cases such as the above example of the irregular walls you might not need to butcher regular size cabinets at all.

Find out if the kitchen range you are considering has wall cabinets that are the same height as floor cabinets. If it does, simply buy a wall cabinet in place of a floor cabinet. They are not as deep and will save you the trouble of trying to cut an awkward shape in the back of your floor cabinet.

Building kitchen cabinets that need to go under a sloping roof can be done in two ways. The easiest option is to buy several different heights of cabinet, so that the cabinets are staggered in height. Attractive boxes can be bought to fit in the gaps, or alternatively you can use the space for storing cookery books.

Secondly, and depending on what style door you choose, you can cut down both the door and the cabinet, so as to allow a perfect fit between the sloping roof and the cabinet itself. Make sure the door won’t scrape against the wall when it’s fitted.

When you are building kitchen cabinets, it’s important to fit all the carcasses in place first, before you fit the doors or interiors. This is the quickest and easiest way to install any kitchen, and it means your doors will stay wrapped up and safely stored away while the main building work is done.

Imagine how you will feel once you hang the doors and get them level, you can then stand back to admire your new kitchen. Your joy will be infectious to everyone around since you designed and built it.

Kitchen Improvements