The next time you are clipping and cutting pictures out of your favorite magazine or watching HGTV, try to keep “function” in mind. The next movements toward all style in kitchen design, functionality of your cabinetry becomes an afterthought. You want your kitchen to embody your sense of style and emit a certain emotion to anyone who walks in the room. However, you may spend countless hours debating over raised panel or slab door styles, but the truth is, functionality of your kitchen cabinets is just as important as the design. Continue reading »

It is very important to determine a budget for any home improvement project, and kitchen remodeling is no exception.

A word of caution: I spent several hours researching kitchen remodeling cost and budgeting on the internet to gather data for this article. I ran into a couple websites that gave square footage pricing for kitchen remodeling. Although I commiserate with their attempt to find a simple method to figure out remodeling pricing, this type of advice is not based in reality. Remodeling jobs in general are so specific to the conditions of the building and tastes of the homeowner that no square footage pricing will ever be realistic. I also ran into many sites that did not give you any real information about establishing a budget but basically interpreted Hanley Wood’s Remodeling Cost vs. Value report which is published each year. You are much better off visiting the Cost vs. Value report online and evaluating the results for yourself.

Like anything else in this world a kitchen remodel is going to cost more than you thought it would and the sky is the limit on what it can cost depending on your tastes. There are multiple factors that go into determining a remodeling budget.

There are several places online you can go to help you establish a basic budget number to start with. My personal recommendation is Remodeling Magazine’s Cost vs. Value Report which is released by region and major city each year. The really nice thing about this report is that it gives a description of the “average” project so that you can guage if your kitchen remodel is going to fall above or below the benchmark. I also find their average pricing to be an accurate reflection of the pricing for our company, so by recommending to clients before I even meet with them that they investigate this report they are more likely to establish a realistic budget we can work within to give them a fantastic kitchen.

While Remodeling Magazine’s report is very helpful, it is still a very one size fits all approach to establishing a budget. Keep reading if you’d like to try to hone your numbers a bit.

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