Why pay top dollar for your kitchen remodel?

I need to begin this blog by identifying myself as a former professional kitchen designer and kitchen remodeler. In my day, my company was considered the best of the best in Central Florida. Fast forward to July 2022... We had just finished remodeling three bathrooms. We had received an estimate from a very highly regarded company and I thought their prices were ridiculous. I could not figure out how they could have come up with their pricing, so I decided to hire a contractor to do the work. Well, that turned out to be a very lengthy and personally time-consuming endeavor. It was our responsibility to select cabinetry, faucets, sinks, lighting, flooring, a company for the glass doors and tub and shower enclosures, paint colors and much more.  It seemed like every minute we were not at work, we were working on this project. I started to think about the value of my time and my wife's time and it was adding up quickly. We are grateful to have found a local tile company that had a wonderful employee who helped us select tiles for the bathrooms. That part worked out wonderfully.  A long 3 months later, the bathrooms were almost complete. My plumber, a friend, was not available to hook up the plumbing, so my contractor hired someone he had used in the past. Well, that plumber managed to cause a leak that went undetected for some time. Long enough to spread under our "floating LVP" flooring throughout most of the downstairs of our home before it was detected. During this time, I believed I came down with COVID. I had never been so sick. I had a sore throat, a horrible headache, and body aches. I kept taking tests and they were all negative. When the leak was finally discovered, it had ruined all of our kitchen base cabinets and quite a bit of the flooring and some of the walls that were finished with Venetian plaster. The flooring was only three years old, and it was already discontinued. That meant that all of the flooring would have to be replaced, including a 1200 SF second floor. So, we went back to the first company who was, what I felt to be, overpriced and got a quote for the entire house remodel. When we received the price we almost fell over in shock. Insurance paid for about 75%, however the balance was still a huge amount. We decided to go with this company because they do everything "in house" and their reviews were truly remarkable. That is what gave us hope. They sub out very little. Well, we are more than half way through the project and now realize we did the right thing. We spent a small fraction of our time on this huge project than the three bathrooms. They gathered up choices for us and did all of the hard work for us. Now that we are more than half way through the process, these are things I noticed as a former professional doing exactly what they are doing for us. 

1. I have never seen cabinetry installation nearly as amazing as what these folks have done. I thought my cabinet installers were terrific, but truthfully, they were nowhere near this caliber. I have visited dozens of kitchen and bath showrooms all over the US in my career and I have never seen workmanship anywhere that compares to what we see in our cabinetry installation.

2. The flooring people spent a solid week floating our concrete floors, in every room, to make sure they were perfectly flat before our LVP floating floors went down.  I had never heard of such a thing. I can understand if the floors were obviously in need, but these floors, in most rooms were quite flat. That was not good enough. They had to be perfectly flat for this crew. They also told us they would be the ones putting in the baseboard molding because they didn't feel anyone else would do as good of a job. They spent a solid 3 weeks on our floors and the folks that did the original floors three years prior, spent less than 1/3 of the time. 

3. We have had regular email lists showing what was going to be done for the following 2 week period, so we could plan accordingly.

4. As in many projects, things come up that were not accounted for. In every case, to our surprise, they covered the costs. 

5. Communication has been almost instant. That has been a breath of fresh air!

6. Telling information from the cabinet installer made us feel we had made the right choice. He said he used to work for this company and two others many years ago. He got frustrated with the other two companies because he would need something and would have to wait so long that he would have to leave the job and come back to it. He told us he only works for this company now, because so much is done "in house' that he can make a request call and it is handled immediately. He also mentioned that he has noticed that all of the tradespeople that work on their projects are amazing. He said he is proud to work for them. In fact, several workers have told us they are proud to work for that company. 

7. The house is always left neat and well organized. Our furniture has been protected nicely. 

I fully believe that any other company would have never been able to complete such a huge project in this timeframe. We would likely have had to extend our lease in the rental by several months. Our personal time would have been so busy with questions, having to monitor quality workmanship, etc. that we would have been overly taxed. We have felt that we can trust this company without hesitation to do excellent work and we don't have to babysit. We just go to the house every day and look in awe at the amazing work that is being done!

My advise... read reviews. Look for long reviews. That means folks are truly thrilled. A 5 star review with a sentence or two, for me, is fairly meaningless. If a company has been in business a long time and you feel their prices are high - there is a reason, they simply cannot be overcharging! They would not be in business if they were overcharging for their services!

I will do a follow up at the end of the process, but as of today, they are a couple of weeks ahead of schedule and the workmanship is stunning!

Below is a sneak peek at the sink we made for our kitchen. This is our exclusive dual tier workstation sink that is 18" wide at the top of the sink and below the ledges. It features two bowl areas without a divider, so two can work at the sink at the same time. The design is also very efficient for those who like to clean up as they go through the process of food preparation. The body of the sink is 316L surgical grade stainless and the face of the apron is 14 gauge brass with a very durable clear coat. Our faucet suites are by Waterstone in a split finish of brushed brass and stainless steel. 

In conclusion, I have learned the hard way, you often get what you pay for! I saved about $30K by doing the bathroom remodeling myself and ended up living in a home for 6 months without a kitchen and then having to move to a rental home for a year. So far, we feel the company, that for now will go nameless, is well worth every penny and more!