apartment therapy changing the world, one room at a time

isn't money relative ?

for those earning a million dollars an year an 100k kitchen would be ?? an highend.

for those who earn 100,000 an year a 30k kitchen would be an high end.???

It is how much you are willing to spend.

Aren't you familiar about the 6000 dollar shower curtain story - owner by some industrialist

Wouldn't "high end" be relative to one's income? Or am I looking at this the wrong way...

I guess my comment seems redundant but I'm just a slow poster.....:)

Isn't it also relative to the size of the kitchen?

In the narrow slots that are standard in my world, you'd have to work at spending $75k on the existing space. There's nowhere to put many an excitingly trendy appliance, and 18" of countertop can be made from a pretty pricey material before you've spent real money.

I think a lot of it depends on region as well. I used to live in the midwest and now I'm an architect here in NYC. In the midwest, a "high end" kitchen is probably at best $30,000. Out here, I think there are varying levels- But once you use the term "custom" and "high end," I think you're shelling out at least $50,000 if not more. You can drop $40,000 on cabinets alone at a lot of these custom Italian Kitchen places (Wende- in NYC at least I've never seen anyone with that small of a kitchen be willing to put that much $$ in anyway, there's little return. If a kitchen is that small where it has less than 4 or 5 "bays" of counterspace/cabinets, there is little point in shelling out for a custom kithcen, you can't really take full advantage of its components).

Considering I can't even afford the purchase of my own apartment with my own kitchen in it, let alone the renos, I'm going to abstain from this one...

I love to live in beautiful surroundings. Even so, spending $100k on a kitchen seems over the top to me. For goodness' sake, how about spending $10k-$20k and giving the rest to charity?

With so many homeless people in the city, I wish some of us would pool our money toward that problem.

Hey cool, my question!

I get that it's relative, but when someone warns that a contractor only deals with high end renovations, I wonder what that means. Does it matter much to my contractor if I get a 6k fridge or a 1.5k fridge? Ditto counters, cabinets, etc? I always heard it costs the same to install cheap as it is to install expensive.

So, "high end" appliances I get. I can price a SubZero online. But a "high end" contractor is a bit more murky..

I am in the market for a kitchen contractor so I appreciate the help.

i think so. the higher the budget so will X% be her price

I live on the Gulf Coast, and am a residential architect working both on my own and for a design-build company. $30K is a pretty normal mid-range 'new-house' kitchen, considering no new houses are being built here to sell for less than $250K. Some of these multi-million-dollar houses near/on the beach (the ones I don't work on) easily spend $100K on cabinets alone.

For me, there's a bit of murkiness about the $75K price point - if you put in the $30K level cabinets, and then splurged to 'chef' appliances, would that get up to $75K? (I don't know, as I don't support that level of consumption, and deliberately focused my practice elsewhere.) Would that $75K kitchen be called 'high-end'? I think a realtor would certainly call it high-end, to reference the fancy appliances, but obviously the cabinet guy wouldn't.

Julianna, you might get some insight from my statement of ignorance above. A 'high-end' contractor is an expert at the stuff that costs a lot. He/she wouldn't know lots of details and be able to shoot from the hip about creative low-end solutions, as I can. But he could tell you that Famous Name just built a castle three doors down with that walk-in wine cooler, and apparently it's got a service problem, so you should probably not get that one. Or that there's a new wonderful pricey granite becoming available, etc.

When I think of "high end" contractors, I think that the contractor will provide a high level of quality service. Phone calls will be returned within a day, abutting seams on countertops will be matched, tiles will be cut cleanly, spills and stains will be wiped up promptly, worksite will be clean, etc.

To some extent, it also applies to the quality of materials used -- hollow doors from HomeDepot, for example, instead of solid wood doors or refinished antique salvage yard doors.

We own our apartment and it is very clear from the paint spots on the floor, caulk used to fill in old nailholes (instead of wood putty), and mismatched moldings that the previous renovation was NOT high-end. In a way, that's ok because we are ripping all the cr*p out anyway.

ok, clarification -- the hollow HD doors are the low-end ones. I'm typing too fast here.
God, I hate my hollow door. Its out as soon as I can find a replacement!

I think Szarka hit the nail on the head. High end to me means someone who deals with people with larger budgets and quality materials. He's not the guy who is used to installing an Ikea kitchen. However, to me, high end also means quality work, so if you could get him to install that Ikea kitchen he should be able to make it look fabulous. I think I read somewhere that the average kitchen remodel costs in the region of 30k, which suggests high end is considerably more, I'd say 75k.

I'm also in the market for a kitchen remodel. My bathroom remodel cost a lot more than I wanted so the kitchen is going to have to be done on the cheap. I guess I'll have to save my pennies for a bit longer.....

I'm not at all suggesting Ikea kitchens don't use quality materials. For the price point their kitchens are great!

We recently bought an apt. in manhattan and had our bathroom renovated. After a disastrous experience with an untested contractor we decided to go with My Home. I have to say their work was great - on time, hassle free and well done. I highly recommend talking to them.

I could recommend another untested but promising route: I can give you the contact for the guy who was hired by My Home and did the great job in our bathroom. The upside is he is much cheaper, but then who knows how things will change given that you don't have an the guarantee of a big company like My Home but are dealing with him one-on-one.

Honestly, I think there is kind of a general sense of appropriateness of what kind of money is spent on a kitchen (or anything else) that has something to do with the value of the property, simply because of the re-sale value.

Different price points of property automatically carry with them differing expectations from Buyers, although each Buyer is individual, too.

In my building, anyone buying one of the one-bedrooms is just about destined to do a gut-renovation of their kitchens, including things like granite countertops, whereas the studio Buyers don't always go to quite as much expense.

One of the big advantages to living in small space, is that I can have the luxury of things like granite counters without the tens of thousands of dollars talked about here. In my last apartment, I had a 6 x 8 kitchen which was gutted to the studs and rebuilt all new except for the three year old refridgerator. I used custom cabinets as well as Ikea cabinets, did a deep undermount sink, new range, dishwasher, slate floor, and granite counters, and did the entire thing for about 9K in materials.

I did nearly all of the work myself, but it shows that you don't have to have a bank in your back pocket to get a nice place. Small space affords luxuries that I could never afford in a large place.

I think the phrase "high end" marks the user as hopelessly middle class, whatever his budget.

ebrown -- ZING! excellent.
Like using the word "classy"!! This high-end kitchen is very classy!

at least it's not *fabulous*...

Actually,"hi end" is a perfectly descriptive term when used in a proper context, f.ex my vendors coming to update the resource library at work would describe this or that new line would use it to indicate the net price I should expect, without getting into specifics. I'm quite satisfied with it.

Why not just state the price?

I guess it's easier with all goods to label them in broad price bands.

For example, high end or expensive watches could be anything from a $3000 Rolex to a $30K Patek Phillipe. It's a bit cumbersome to say that you are a dealer, for example, in watches that go for between $3K and $30K.

Bad example but you get the picture I hope.

*ebrown, it's sort of close to jamie pup example. High end could be many things; it depends.

Just listing the price would be "going into specifics", which I said I prefer not going into while listening to a short presentation.
For example, if Gretchen Bellinger's rep (link at my name) comes to the office and tells me the new plush mohair is a bit on a hi side, I assume it's close to $300 per yard (which isn't unusual for GB) - and worth every penny.
If another rep, let's say Desightex' uses same phrase, I know the price is more like $65-80; and that's high - for them.

If somewhere in the mid of the project I decide to use their fabric - I'll phone and learn all the specifics about it, including the price for my yardage.
'

Terry:

Unfortunately, homelessnesses is not going to be cured with money. Bill and Melinda Gates have the money. Their foundation looks for human problems where money can make a difference, and it has not made any grants to reduce or end homelessness for good reason!

So when someone describes a contractor as dealing mostly with high end jobs (as in previous thread), can I call them or not for my 50k kitchen? Or is my 50k beneath them in some way?

Julianna, I'd call and if they're snotty, I'd call someone else.
I just rehashed the entire IKEA kitchen cabinet thing in an older thread...uh...have to reload the page.
http://www.apartmenttherapy.com/ny/030306/good-questions/good-questions-ikea-kitchen-cabinets-or-better-006836

It was the Makeover Your Kitchen for Thousands Less issue of Consumer Reports, and covered EVERYTHING you'd need to know about kitchens.

Maybe I'm just totally naive (which I am), but the cabinets I pick out should be able to be installed by anyone who installs cabinets. Whether they do it on the side for me as a favor or do it for business charging (insert ridiculous sum of money here) dollars for the installation.

What are we paying for anyway? I want cabinets that don't fall off the walls, after they're installed. I want them level.

What does someone who gets paid more money DO for that money?

There was a redone kitchen in BHG awhile back and we were all astounded that it cost just under $50K. I went around, found similar things via IKEA and did that kitchen for $15K. Was all the rest labor?

They'd better be bringing a massage table and a masseur named Sven for that kind of cash. Plus lunch. I'm just not seeing how it can cost so much.

Here's hoping stacked cardboard boxes for cabinets become all the rage. Those I could afford.

Hey Julianna, I listed the work done in the 9J builder thread. Even though I said I had a lot done that was in the context of the original email I sent to the Craigslist poster who just wanted a closet built. Actually this was a small 2-3 day job that ended up costing around $15K. Worth every penny. They are not snotty, won't laugh at you.

What are you paying for? Well you are paying for skills, accurate estimates or quotes, the ability to hit deadlines or milestones despite previously unkown issues that crop up during the work, high standard of finishing work, clean up every day, mitgation of dust/debris, very tight project management (handling timeline, milestones and change requests), etc..

In other words everything that you would hope you get but you seldom do. This kind of project management and execution takes a skillset and experience that costs in the market place. The really cheap guys *may* cut corners and certainly will not get paid enough to execute all of the above comprehensively.

Read these two threads to see how something as simple as installing Ikea kitchen cabinets can go wrong:

http://www.apartmenttherapy.com/ny/080905/kitchen/traemand-the-ikea-cabinet-installation-experts-003489

http://www.apartmenttherapy.com/ny/110805/good-questions/good-questions-what-do-you-do-when-the-work-is-bad-004914

If only it were that simple Andree.

Jamie Pup, I haven't figured out anything in this life yet. I go to the auto repair shop. I ask for the oil leak to be fixed. I pay for the work. The leak is worse.

I go back. I ask for the oil leak to be fixed again. I ask for the lights to be fixed, as I have to bang on the side marker lamps for them to work sometimes. I ask for the tie-rod end to be replaced (bad steering), and for an alignment.

I paid for the work.

The oil leaks again.
The lamps have to be banged on to work sometimes.
The steering wheel is crooked and the car has a propensity to turn to the right.

I go to the dentist. The one recommended by Denti-Cal. I fill out a long questionnaire on various problems. Some of my teeth are very sensitive to hot-cold. And are sensitive to other things, like metal...or just plain cool air.

I try to talk to the dentist about my teeth and treatment and his attitude was to "sit down, shut up and hold on" while in the chair.

I leave with a numb mouth, thinking how nice it will be to have the problems resolved.

I now cannot eat on the right side of my mouth. My mouth/teeth on that side are in WORSE shape than they were before he got in there.

Now, I figure these people are getting paid to do a job. And the job they are doing should fix the problems. It's not like they have a label that says "half-assed dentist-we might fix it, we might not" or the same for the auto repair place. Or the cabinet installer.

I thought that people that were paid to do a job should do the job adequately. People and businesses that don't know what the heck they're doing ought not be in business.

I just want to bang my head against the wall, because the quality of workmanship overall has changed so much. What work ethic?

So what you're saying is that the only dependable people are the ones that cost a lot? Dang.

I guess this is where all the recommendations come in on this site. I'm certainly glad to see those recommendations and hope they help others. Because right now, I'm so sick of crap workmanship that...well, I guess I'm spitting all over the place again.

We install Ikea kitchens for lots of our customers and we do it well. We treat our customers the way we would want to be treated. We want to be proud of our work and we depend on word of mouth advertising so doing shoddy work just doesn't pay. There are unethical people in all walks of life. But let it be remembered that that are contractors (and car repair people, attorneys, accountants, etc.) that pride themselves on honesty and excellence no matter how big or small, high end or low end, the work.

Hi Susan Jalo - Do you do installations in Manhattan? If not, can you recommend a contractor that would do Ikea kitchens to me.

Thanks
Sudie

I feel bad for anyone in the high end market with the recession in full force now. A good contractor friend of mine says even those with money don't want to spend it right now and give off the wrong impression to those who are struggling to make it.

Of course this has helped companies like Ross, Marshall, & other discount stores. Century21 in NYC is busier than ever. Gray & Sons in Miami, FL is getting more consignments of Rolex, Cartier, & Tag Heur than ever. Of course even these guys can only prosper for so long. They need a supply from the luxury stores to continue to make it. Right now those luxury stores are cutting back on inventory significantly.