Kitchen renovation question

nancy324

nancy324

Cathlete
I know this is completely unfitness-related, but I need to ask.

Has anyone here ever used the Expo Design Center of Home Depot to renovate a kitchen (or other room)? DH and I visited one today and were pretty impressed with what they had to offer, but almost fell off our chairs when we heard the estimate.

What has your experience been with Expo Design center? Was their work good? Are you happy with your kitchen? What did you think about the price? Thanks so much in advance for any comments.

-Nancy

P.S. If you know of any good home renovation forums, please share!
 
I have not personally used Home Depot but I have a friend who got a quote of $5000 for new kitchen cabinetry. They ended up using a local guy who did a beautiful job for $2000.

We got a quote from Home Depot for retiling the roof on one of our houses. I can't remember what the exact amount was but it was much higher than anyone else we checked with.

So, my somewhat learned opinion about Home Depot's charges is that they are WAY over priced and you'd be better off going somewhere else.
 
Nancy, we are about to have our kitchen floors redone by them this upcoming month. Yes, the price was steep but I do trust them. Once we bought a Fisher-Paykel dishwasher from them & for some reason this one would not maintain an adequate water pressure, so my dishes were never washed right. They sent out people to fix it and it would break again. Well, a little over a year later, we were still having problems & the manager asked us to pick out another dishwasher, he recommended an Asko & they traded it out with no further charge. I also received a $300 rebate from Fisher-Paykel initially, and I was not asked to return it.

Marla
 
We are 3 weeks into our project..completely gutted the kitchen and main bath.
I looked into Expo and others of that kind.
We ended up going with a local builder that we got by word of mouth..quite large, however.
We are very happy with the project.
We also tried an independent architect: bad, bad, bad: no interest in our small thing.
Renovating a kitchen is a very iffy thing. We've had bad luck with large companies and god luck with small companies.
My best advice: use word of mouth.
S.
 
To be more specific, the prices of the cabinetry, appliances, countertops, flooring, etc. all sounded reasonable to us. It was the price of the labor that caused our jaws to drop.

They said that the price of labor for contractors in the NY area has gone through the roof. Apparently, real estate is so expensive that a lot of people are just expanding or renovating what they have and contractors are in high demand. Therefore, labor prices have escalated. If this is true, I guess we'll run into the same high labor cost no matter who we use. Therefore, we are giving Home Depot serious consideration and looking into selling our first born on E-bay. :+
 
I wasn't real clear in my post but it was the labor that drove the Home Depot prices up for the kitchen cabinets and the reroofing. If it were me I'd think Home Depot was just telling me thatlabor costs are through the roof and I wouldn't take their word for it. I'd do some checking around. I get really pissed when sales people try to convince me I'm not getting ripped off.
 
Hi Nancy. My boss and his wife just finished with extensive renovations of their place in Brooklyn. Don't know if it included the kitchen, but I will ask him on Tuesday and PM you if it's anything relevant/helpful.
 
I have also found the labour costs through Home Depot prohibitively expensive. I had them come and quote on tiling my laundry room at my old house, and the tile was going to cost around $100, and the guy quoted me $700 to do the room. Huh? If I were you, I would try to go to some other kitchen contractors and get quotes.
 
Hi - Had my kitchen done by Home Depot two years ago. Got Kraft Maid cabinets (hickory) and corian counters. The design is all done by computer. We ripped out the old cabinets and the floor ourselves. There are always hidden extras that you didn't plan on. i.e new outlets, re-locating heat vents. Our ceramic tile floor was done independently. Overall, I am satisfied. A couple of mistakes were made though, but nothing I can't live with. My suggestion is to get a couple more estimates before making up you mind. That way you can compare prices. It did seem like it took forever to finish the job. HTH.

Mar:)
 
Oh, thanks Mar! We are also looking at Kraftmaid cabinets, and we'll probably get Silestone counters. Everything will be ripped out and replaced. It took forever to finish the job? We were told our job would be done in 5 days flat, except for the counters, but that the kitchen would be fully useable in 5 days. I really like the sound of that!

My mom had her kitchen renovated 2 years ago, and she was ecstatically pleased with her designer/contractor, so I guess I'd better speak with him to compare prices.
 
Thanks very much, Bunbun. If they're happy with the work it would be great to know who they used. Thanks!
 
Hi Nancy!

We are in the planning stages of redoing our kitchen too. We checked in to Home Depot and I have to agree we were floored at the estimate. The price of the cabinets was $5000, but like others have said it's the labor that is jaw dropping. Plus they wanted about $2500 to demolish our kitchen. Hello?! I'm pretty good with a sledge hammer so I don't think I'll pay for that! Plus the estimate for the counters was so way over the top that we are looking elsewhere.

I asked my brother about using Home Depot for our cabinets as he is in the new home building industry. The general concensus is that they are ok quality, not great, but not bad either, but overpriced for what you get. His advice to me was to get as many bids as possible before making a decision. Your kithen is the most important space in the house and the most expensive to remodel.

Good Luck!

:) Nicole
 
Just had to say that I luv your new pic. Haven't been on the site in over a week and so I'm probably a little late in noticing.
 
Nicole-
Thanks for sharing your info and your brother's tips. They estimated our labor at between $20,000 - $25,000, and we're not having anything unusual done. Frankly, because our kitchen is small, we were hoping to get the whole job done for that price. When you add cabinets, counters, appliances, flooring, lighting, electrical and plumbing to that, the price of everything together is, well, :eek: :eek:
 
Now that I think about it, I believe the reason they are so expensive is because a middle man (Home Depot) is involved. They hire out contracters to do the work for you and I'm sure they take a cut. So I think you are paying for the convenience of not having to find your own contractor. I would definitely ask around your friends, family and co-workers for recommendations.

We have been slowly remodeling alot of things over the past three years since we moved in. Right away we bought new appliances because those that came with the house were unsatisfactory to say the least! We started from the top down so to speak and scraped the popcorn ceilings, retextured and painted. Then we did the electrical and lighting and put recessed lights in the kitchen and around the house. We also installed a few ceiling fans. We are now working on a new stone fireplace and we just finished grouting that a few minutes ago. Next is new tile flooring in the kitchen and entry and then our new wood floors. We have been so lucky that we have been able to do it all ourselves.

The kitchen however is another matter. Are you considering using Home Depot to do all of those projects for you? I would seriously consider hiring/interviewing different contracters for the jobs. My gut feeling is that you could save yourself some money if you shop around.

:) Nicole
 
Don't know if this helps or not, as it is not about the kitchen...

We used Home Depot to roof our house, and it was a complete and utter disaster. I won't go into details, but we sued them and got a refund on all of our money, and then had a local roofer come out and do a GOOD job in three days (vs HD who did a HORRIBLE job over the course of SIX months with no communication whatsoever (from the local and national HD people)!)

Just be careful!

Wendy
 
Nicole, you have been doing it yourselves? How are you doing that? I'm certainly impressed.

My understanding is that as little as 2 years ago we could have had this work done by them for half the price they are quoting us now. They were considered to be the lower-priced option by the interior designers we spoke with. We thought, well, we don't do much cooking and we don't spend much time in the kitchen, so let's go with the lower-priced option. Now, I don't know if that's changed, or if prices have just changed dramatically.
 
Sometimes I really don't know how we do it ourselves!! It's been a long process for sure, but doing a bit at a time as we can afford it and as time allows has been nice. Somehow a large bill at one time scares me. But I know it's coming as we have yet to do the kitchen cabinets and counters. :eek:

We have been fortunate since both my husband and I are pretty handy around the house. My husbands father was a master electrician so my husband was an electrician's apprentice growing up. Definitely was enough knowledge to do our projects. Growing up in my family we did many things ourselves like painting and plumbing repairs. I'm an information hound so I really like to know how to do things. Honestly, we read alot of books and study how to do a project for a while before we ever begin. That's why it takes so long. But we always have a project in the works and that keeps it interesting. If we had waited until we saved up enough money to do it all at once, it probably would have never happened. But a little bit here and there worked out fine. We still have alot to do that's for sure, but somehow it seems manageable.

That's interesting about the pricing difference. I would definitely shop around after hearing that bit of news. You could find that HD is competitive or completely out to lunch. We got our bid about 6 months ago and it was $5000 for the cabinets and $5000 for the counters not including any kind of labor. We don't have a large kitchen either. I know someone with a larger kitchen who went with a different company for granite counters and the price was about half the HD quote. From that moment I decided that when we were ready to do the kitchen that we would do some serious shopping.
 
Nancy, the reason the labor is so high is they sub-contract to local builders (and I am sure get some percentage of the profit). You are better off finding a builder.

Here is my story: I bought my kitchen flooring (Armstrong linoleum which was NOT cheap) at Lowe's. I had them do the install. They sent some local guy to do it and although it looked like he did a good job, after a few months, it started to come up along the seam. It turned out they installed it directly OVER my heating pipe in the basement, so the glue dried up. The REASON they put the seam there was because my kitchen is large and they were able to use smaller pieces (the idiot contractor told me later)... i.e., they saved some negligible amount on material. This was a joint decision between the contractor and the guy running the dept at Lowe's. (I recall there was a lot of phone discussion while the guy was there.)

Anyway, long story short, I ended up in a huge fight with Lowe's, who eventually agreed to refund the costs for the materials but NOT for the install because we were just out of the warranty period. (ETA, the labor costs more than the materials!) I am grateful they were somewhat fair, but I would NOT use them again - because my kitchen floor still needs to be redone. Needless to say, it left a very bad taste in my mouth.

Good luck!
Marie
 
Oh Marie! What an awful time you went through. Obviously, the warranty period was unrealistically short. Renovations are difficult enough even if everything goes well, and I am dreading ours. A screw-up like that would test my limits. It really does help to hear the experiences of others. I'm sorry you went through that. Thanks for sharing.

-Nancy
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Our Newsletter

Get awesome content delivered straight to your inbox.

Top