Recently we had decided to do some home remodeling projects. While we all gathered together in our living room and took a glance through our kitchen, we decided that the best place to start would be the kitchen. For the most part of our time that we are home is spent in the kitchen especially with meal preparation, cleanup and eating. Besides it seems that guests tend to congregate in the kitchen area.

We started to research kitchen remodeling costs and promptly had to make some adjustments in our priorities as this was not going to be easy on the pocket. There are many hidden expenses when it comes to tallying up kitchen remodeling costs.

While talking to our local contractor, we were able to find out an estimate on having the remodeling professionally done. First he asked us to draw up a wish list of things that we wanted in the kitchen and to rank them accordingly in order from “have to have” to “it would be nice”. This was very useful because with kitchen remodeling costs as high as they are you can quickly pare down your wish list.

At the top of our wish list was to change our cabinets. The cabinets were very dark wood and made the kitchen appear small and closed in. In addition we also wanted to put a tile counter top on to match the tile on the floor. As for the window area by the sink, I wanted to expand it in order to allow more light in. We also wanted to remove the wallpaper and change out the exhaust hood above the stove. Our appliances were neutral colors and worked well; though my husband wanted to convert the electric range top from electric to gas. In spite of all the things we had decided upon on the list, we felt confident that we would have enough money in our savings account to handle all the kitchen remodeling costs.

However we were shocked when the estimate for the kitchen remodeling costs came in. Although we would have to take out a loan to complete everything that we had put on the wish list, we began to look at alternatives to keep down the kitchen remodeling costs. First we learnt how to the surface of the cabinets for painting. By painting the cabinets, for instance, an almond color made the kitchen look much brighter. We procured new hardware for the cabinets and the change was simply fantastic. In order to make the kitchen window area look larger I merely removed the curtain that I had hanging in it. Just by taking down the curtain during the painting project I discovered that without it there was more light in the room. Our counter top also looked revived with the lighter cabinets, so we kept it and put up a tile back splash instead. All this really proved to be cost effective and was a part of the remodeling that we could do on our own! Subsequently we got rid of the wallpaper and painted the walls a lemon yellow. In addition we replaced the exhaust fan with one in an almond color to match the cabinets. Today our kitchen not only looks beautiful but we have the satisfaction of completing the majority of the work ourselves and in turn were able to limit down our kitchen remodeling costs. We did not use the local contractor but he undoubtedly helped us have a new kitchen within our means.