We deal with a lot of rental property owners and one of them had a good point that I thought I would share with everyone.   One of the biggest challenges that you face as a landlord is how to get more rent out of your units with investing a lot of time or money into them.  If they are outdated or in need of repair, they are going to be harder to rent and you will get less rent for them (that is just a fact of life).   So when a customer approached us about buying 10 kitchens at once, I had to find out why.  He made a great point about rental units that I had never thought about.

He said there are 3 things that stick out in an apartment or rental unit:  the carpet, the kitchen, and the bathroom(s).   If any of them look worn or outdated, you will have a hard time renting a unit.  Since kitchens can be expensive, he searched high and low to find a cost effective solution and he came across us.  He said that for roughly $3,000 per unit (10 units) he could update the kitchen cabinets  and the bathroom, and raise the rent an extra $250 a month!   That basically means that he has the renovation paid off in a year, and he is now bringing in an extra $250 per unit from here on out.   Not only that, but the fact that they had updated kitchens and bathrooms made the units more marketable to renters.    I never really thought about it that way. Most landlords are looking for ways to avoid spending money, when this guy was out there spending money to make more money.  He didn't want me to mention his name, but he said it was okay to share his secret.

So for all the rental property owners and landlords out there, you might want to look at it from this guys point of view.

Granite is certainly a challenging material to work with, especially when you are dealing with larger pieces.   The weight and awkward size of the vanity tops makes it so that they have to be strapped to a pallet.   Once you start getting into the larger size tops, the amount of surface area starts to become a problem.   Since granite is a natural material, it will inevitably have stronger and weaker points in the surface.  

Over the past couple of months we have run into major issues with the larger tops, particularly the 61" tops.   The excessive vibration on the large surface (and mis-handling from the trucking companies), was leading to a large amount of damage.  This not only creates problems from the customers stand point, but it is also a nightmare for us from a claims stand point.   Because of that, we have decided to stop shipping the 61" tops, atleast until we can figure out a method that the carriers can handle.   We are still offering them for local pickup, but shipping is no longer an option at this point.

Today is the big day that the reveals for the two different episodes of "Renovation Rescue" are being filmed.  Unfortunately due to the weather in the Northeast, we were not able to make it to Denver to be there for filming.   The production team promised to take a lot of pictures of the Marquis Cinnamon and the Cherryville vanities, and the transformation that occurred.   Check back for pictures from the show.    We just received the layout for the kitchen that is going to be installed on an episode of "Kitchen Renovations"... this one will be filmed in Philadelphia, so it should be exciting.   That show will be taped at the beginning of March, and they have decided to install the Marquis Cinnamon Kitchen Cabinets.