Your kitchen is probably the most important room in your home and a place for your family to congregate throughout the day. But, despite how exciting renovating your kitchen is, it’s an incredibly expensive project. So, how often should you renovate your kitchen to keep your home’s nucleus looking in top shape?
Experts recommend renovating your kitchen once every 10-15 years to account for wear and tear, keeping within a budget, and changing styles. You can also make incremental changes on a year-by-year basis to avoid spending a large sum of money in one go and enduring a drawn-out renovation process.
There’s no question that kitchen renovations are an exciting undertaking and can completely transform the way you live in your home. But knowing when to renovate is also important because of what a massive financial undertaking a full kitchen renovation is.
When You Should Renovate Your Kitchen
If you’ve considered what needs to change about your kitchen, now is the time to start deciding when to do it. Here are a few sure-fire signs that you should renovate right now.
When You Have The Money
Money is always the number one concern when it comes to kitchen renovations, simply because it is the most expensive room in the house to renovate. Everything from cabinets to countertops to faucets to appliances like fridges and ovens is exorbitantly expensive.
A full kitchen remodeling will set you back between $15,000 and $25,000 for a mid-range overhaul and can exceed $50,000 for the high-end makeovers.
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So, if you’ve come into some money or managed to save enough over time that it’s within your budget, it’s the first sign that you should consider a kitchen renovation.
When It’s Damaged
If your kitchen is already older than 10 years, there’s a good chance that the grouting in your tiles might be loose, there is a leaking tap, or your kitchen counters have been chipped. Whatever it may be, your kitchen looks very old, and you’re just not enjoying living in it.
And if you start to see some major damage, you may want to consider making changes as soon as possible.
Before You Sell
Homebuyers will often cite the kitchen as the biggest factor in their decision to purchase, and it’ll help you to sell your property a lot faster too!
When Kitchen Appliances Die
Most of your big kitchen appliances like fridges, stoves, microwaves, and dishwashers will last for between five and ten years and, when they start to fall apart, you’re going to have to make pretty sizeable investments. So why not take it a step further and make some structural changes to your kitchen while you’re at it?
When You Need To Change The Layout
Perhaps when you bought your home a decade ago, your family was a lot smaller. Now you have another two or three children, and the space is starting to feel claustrophobic.
Or, you’ve gathered such a vast collection of tableware and appliances that you just need more storage space, such as an extra cabinet somewhere.
If your kitchen doesn’t feel comfortable living in anymore, do yourself a favor and improve your standard of living with a kitchen renovation.
And, if none of these signs describe your circumstances, you may want to wait for a bit before you get started with your renovations.
NOTE: Experts recommend renovating your kitchen once every 10 to 15 years. Still, the timeline will be different for each kitchen, so it’s not a train smash if you’re renovating outside of either side of that timeframe.
3 Things To Consider Before Planning Your Next Kitchen Renovation
Before you start planning your next kitchen renovation, you need to consider a few things. Kitchen renovations may be fun and exciting, but they’re also tumultuous and expensive.
So you don’t want to do an overhaul too frequently, nor do you want your kitchen to look tacky, old, and worn out, so you don’t want to put renovations off for too long either.
And when you’re planning, you still need to think about exactly what you’re going to do.
Here are a few things that you should think about.
1. Wear And Tear
Because your kitchen is used so frequently, it would make sense that cabinets, surfaces, faucets, tiles, and appliances might look a little worse for wear.
If you’re going to do a renovation, consider investing in high-quality products that will outlast the more affordable options. This will save you money in the long run because your next renovation will therefore be much further away.
2. New Trends
Before you start buying new cabinets and appliances that are the hottest thing on the market, beware that styles change. All the time. So what’s popular today could make you cringe five or ten years from now.
TIP: When deciding on which fixtures and fittings you’ll buy, opt for something with a timeless appeal. Stick to neutral colors and, if you insist on a more “out there” color, reserve it for accent colors, which you can easily change.
3. Functionality
Finally, you need to think about what would make your kitchen more functional? How do you make the room flow better? Is there any unused space? Could you be smarter about the way you store your kitchenware?
Perhaps you’d want to add an island for more cabinet room and a substitute dinner table. Rearranging how you use your spaces can transform the entire kitchen atmosphere and make it more sociable and functional.
Is It Worth It To Renovate A Kitchen?
Considering all of the factors above, the final question you need to ask yourself is whether it’s worth renovating your kitchen.
Beautiful kitchens are more of a luxury than a necessity, and perhaps you’re happy with it the way it is. Besides, that’s a lot of money to burn through! So, is it worth it to renovate a kitchen? Check out this article where I wrote about whether or not kitchen renovations pay off.
Everyone has their own set of priorities, so you can only answer that question yourself, but the fact of the matter is that everyone in the family is in the kitchen several times a day. It truly is the heart and soul of the home.
It’s a place for the family to get together, to make food (which is significantly more fun in a nice kitchen); it’s the most expensive room to renovate because of how central it is to your experience of your home.
So, considering that you only have to do it once every ten to 15 years and that it will have such a profoundly positive effect on your lifestyle, yes, it is absolutely worth it!
It is a decision that you won’t regret, as long as you are smart with your planning and do so at the right time.
Conclusion
Knowing when the time is right to renovate your kitchen is nuanced and depends entirely on your circumstances and your priorities, but you do need to pay close attention to wear and tear and where you can make improvements.
But also beware of the financial constraints that it will put on you and your family – not to mention how stressful renovations can be!