Hey you guys. John from #90 here. Dave decided to blog shame me into writing another post about our kitchen for the blog. I guess it worked. This post is gonna be a real gem. Totally worth the wait. Dave is going to love it, too:

So you guys didn’t see my first post? That’s okay, no one else read it either. A quick refresher on the details: we had a budget of $125k to gut our kitchen (including opening it to the dining room) and our master bathroom with a project plan that broke ground in early October and ended in mid December. Want more detail? Read part 1.

Here’s how things worked out: The budget…What budget, you guys? Our general contractor, Britton Homes, came in close to their estimate, but we added on a pile of extras (better tile, additional cabinets, etc). Total price: $150k. More importantly, Britton Homes finished the job on time and we were back in our kitchen right before Christmas. Pretty good stuff, you guys.

In the end, Britton Homes was definitely the right choice for us. Highly recommend these guys. Great attention to detail, really easy communication (send an email or text…they respond…how bout that?), and a desire to do good work on time. Maybe they’ll even get on the recommended contractors list on here.

As for the kitchen and bathroom, below are some pics…of the kitchen. I didn’t include pics of the bathroom. Sorry you guys. But I can assure you that unlike most posts on this blog, I’m not in there right now writing this. Anyway, here are the pictures you guys:

Turning the blog over to John today. Just got underway with his kitchen & master bath renovation.

Hey you guys, John here. From #90 aka that white house on central Randlett with the big farmer’s porch. My turn to write a guest post because Dave is off at some suuuuuper high level and important meetings with Slow Scott downtown. Or maybe he’s really at the Tree going to cold one city. Hopefully he at least has pants on. Anyway. Whatever.

So Dave asked if I could please do a post on the kitchen and master bath remodel that we just started. I know, I know…another post on someone doing a remodel. But seriously, this blog has been a ghost town in the past week, so beggars can’t be choosers, right?

Back to more important things you guys. Here are the important details of what we’re doing:

● Kitchen scope – Gut and rebuild the kitchen. Opening the dining room to the kitchen, adding an island, new cabinets in a reconfigured L shaped layout; new tile in first floor powder room; replace back door and kitchen windows; move location of door to basement. We’re not replacing any appliances since we just did that two years ago.

● Master bath scope – Rebuild shower with new plumbing, tile, and fixtures; Retile floor; remove radiator and replace with toe-kick or radiant heat; add new vanity; redo drywall and ceiling.

● Contractor: Britton Homes – A family run company that hasn’t done a ton in the area, but has great reviews and a bunch of awards on AngiesList. Super easy to deal with (returns calls, texts, and emails very fast), straightforward pricing, and, at least so far, really keep the job site clean. A++ so far.
● Schedule: 8 – 10 weeks. Broke ground on October 5 and scheduled to be done around December 8.

● Total budget — $125k — $87k for the kitchen; $38k for master bath. Note that this does NOT include $$ or appliances since we upgraded all of those about 3 years ago.

A couple of other notes:

● We did a refi with the RandlettPark.com recommended mortgage guy, George Rodgers. Highly recommend, you guys.
● Contractors are all super busy right now (low rates + high appraisals = lots of homeowners with cash = lots of remodel projects?). Definitely not a buyers market on this front. Was really hard to pin most people down.
● Having never done a project of this scale, it’s pretty nerve-wracking to have someone come into your house and proceed to fill up a dumpster with the remains of your kitchen. Make sure you stock up on bourbon or similar beverages.
● Thinking about putting an after hours padlock on the required jobsite port-o-potty. Sorry Dave.

Anyway, that’s all for now you guys. Expect additional comprehensive updates as the project goes on. You guys.