Every experienced DIY home improvement enthusiast started somewhere, with a first big project. If a kitchen remodel is yours, congratulations! Doing some or all of the work yourself is a great way to save money! There are, however, a few things about kitchen remodeling you really need to know before you begin.
You Might Need Permits
If all you’re doing is swapping out some cabinets for new RTA models, or replacing appliances with like models in the same position, you probably won’t need a permit for that. On the other hand, more major modifications will mean checking with your local authority to make sure, and applying for permits as needed. These include things like switching from an electric range to gas or vice-versa, changing anything about plumbing, making modifications to the electrical wiring, adding or removing entrances, exits, or windows, or doing anything involving moving walls or changing the livable square-footage of your house.
Don’t Bite Off More than You Can Chew
Be honest about your capabilities—and the amount of time you have to devote to the project. A kitchen is a very important room for day to day life, perhaps even more so than your first instincts tell you. You can mitigate the inconvenience by setting up a temporary area with portable appliances, and non-perishable foods for a long weekend. But what if you don’t quite get done? Can your family live without a kitchen for a week? How about two? How much will that cost in meals eaten out?
Luckily there is an entire spectrum of possibility between totally doing everything yourself, and hiring a contractor to do it and going on vacation. For example, you could order RTA cabinets and assemble them yourself, pack up everything in the old ones to get it out of the way, then have a contractor install the new cabinets without as much work required. You could also potentially do the demolition of removing the old cabinets and flooring, then have a contractor install the new components.
If You Might Need a Contractor, Involve Them from the Start
If you are going to do part of the project yourself, or even think that might end up being the reality if things don’t all go exactly to plan (Hint: Things very rarely go exactly to plan), you really should involve a reliable contractor right from the start. You see, not all contractors are willing to finish a job they didn’t begin. For example, many will be unwilling to deal with a homeowner’s attempt at demolition, or to fix a botched, half-finished attempt at installing flooring or wall cabinets. If they are, it may be at a premium, and end up costing you the same, or even more than it would have to simply hire a contractor in the first place.
The good news, though, is that we’ve never met a contractor who wouldn’t be willing to install RTA kitchen cabinets you assembled yourself—it’s not really any different from installing pre-assembled or custom-made cabinetry, after all. Even better, while much of what’s required to remodel a kitchen takes an impressive array of tools, all you need to assemble RTA Cabinet Store’s quality cabinets is a simple screwdriver. Assembling them yourself can save you thousands in labor and shipping, and is a fun, easy project almost anyone can tackle, without disabling the existing kitchen while you work on them!
