kitchen cabinet refacing

[Eddie G]

My wife and I are thinking of refacing our kitchen cabinets only because they are pickled oak and we want to get hard wood floors and can't think what color floor goes with the pickled oak cabinets. I called a refacer for an estimate and he wanted over $12k!! We have 9 foot ceilings so the cabinets are the larger ones (48" I think) and we have an island and a small cabinet over the frige. The rest of the cabinets are the standard 10X10' L-shape.

Anyway, is 12K ridiculously high for refacing? At Home Depot they have Thomasville cabinets for a standard 10x10 kitchen for 3k plus 1600 for installation. I cannot see how adding an island and a small cabinet to this, and making them 48", will make the cost that much more.

Needless to say we decided to keep the cabinets as they are, but I still wanted to know about the refacing price and if that is normal. The refacer would put 1/4 inch plywood over the existing cabinet before putting on the laminate.

Thanks!!

Eddie G

[No]

Where are you located? $12K does seem high. I would assume thats all new doors. Look at Rockler for DIY kits for doing this.

They use pressure sensitive veneer for the frames and then you put on all new matching doors.

[Scott.Ekman]

You might also find this article from Rockler useful:

"Updating Your Kitchen with Confidence"

It talks specifically about the decision to update cabinets vs replace them.