Z.Z.Daily Construction

When you plan a kitchen remodel or upgrade, kitchen cabinets is one of the critical decisions you need to make. And kitchen cabinets can also be one of the most expensive components of your kitchen remodeling project.

You have many kitchen cabinet choices, but you can break it down to three basic approaches, with a fourth option you may not have considered.

• At the top end, you can go with completely customized cabinets. You hire a custom cabinet builder to build you tailor made cabinets from scratch. This is the most expensive category, and can easily start at $20,000 and up. With this approach, everything depends on the expertise, fine craftsman skills and experience of your cabinet builder. If you have an unusual floor or space plan, or you’re interested in some unique cabinet designs, this may be the best way to go. By the way, we have many years of experience with custom cabinetry fabrication and installation at Z.Z Daily Construction.
• Premium brand pre-manufactured cabinets from companies like KraftMaid.  Premium brand cabinet manufactures can offer excellent quality, choices of materials, a variety of hardware options, and  with many designs and styles to choose from. Most cabinets come in standard dimensions and sizes, so you have a little less flexibility than with custom cabinets when it comes to odd sizes and dimensions to fit your ideal kitchen plan. Kitchen cabinets in this category typically run between $10,000 and $20,000 for the average kitchen remodel.
• Budget priced kitchen cabinets from the big home improvement centers like Home Depot and Lowes. Many customers start here when shopping for cabinets, most likely because of the familiarity, and a sense that this will be the money saving choice. We generally don’t recommend the home centers for kitchen cabinets. These cabinets tend to be fairly low quality, inferior materials and construction, and poor hardware options.  In the end, many folks don’t actually save that much money with the home center cabinet choices.  Worse yet, you can end up stuck with kitchen cabinets that leave you dissapointed everytime you step into your kitchen, and you may have to live with this choice for years. (more…)

Home remodels, any way you slice it, somehow always end up bigger jobs than you anticipate. Most homeowners are not well prepared when they take on a home remodel project. Unfortunately, the lack of preparation can lead to higher costs, poor quality results and unnecessary added stress and anxiety.

Make sure you do your home remodel planning first

Proper planning helps you avoid the rush. Most homeowners underestimate the number of decisions they need to make before they even get the construction underway. When you don’t give yourself sufficient time to plan up front, you’ll tend to make hasty decisions that you’ll either want to change later. Or worse, in your hurry to get moving, you’ll overlook an important consideration that can cost you much more after you’ve started to build.

A rule of thumb to remember; Anything you have to re-do a second time to get it right will always cost more than doing it right the first time.

Whether working with a designer or consulting with your contractor for ideas and advice, the variety of decisions you’ll need to work through will add up quickly. You’ll do better if you give yourself the proper time to cover the planning phase up front, and go in with a positive attitude. Enjoy the planning steps and make it fun.

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