New kitchens costs - Opinions please

ubdai

Wife wants a new kitchen so have been out and about getting prices.

They are
Tesco Value kitchen - Shiny black (free fitting) £6000
Homebase Vermont £10k - after discount:j £8000
B&Q IT Solid oak £8900 with fitting or £4070 kitchen on its own
Benchmarx Oakhurst with a local fitter £6755 fitted but with VAT£1351 to add and a new kitchen door as well supplied and fitted.

Other works
Rewire kitchen and new consumer unit £550 or £975 from two different sparkies. Why the price diff?
Plaster kitchen £460. One full wall and ceiling and remainder from below work surface level to ceiling.

I am in West Essex, so if anyone can recommend another installer it would be appreciated.

I sometimes wish we had never started this project. Especially after she goes and breaks the wash basin the bathroom as well. Now need a new bathroom suite as well. (Hope my lottery numbers come up tonite).

ubdai

cddc

Of the four mentioned, Benchmarx are by a long long way the best units, and are the ones I would go for. Get a price comparison with Wickes as they do the same kitchens and currently, at least until the end of the month, I suspect will be cheaper......though possibly not, once fitting is included.

The lower sparkies quote sounds very reasonable to me, I would have expected somwhere between the two quotes tbh..

ubdai

I thought I would be clever and get a kitchen fitter to get a quote from Benchmarx for a kitchen. Thinking that that he would get trade cost and it would work out cheaper than the big sheds.

In the end his price is the same as the sheds. How can I approach him to ask why, without rubbing him up the wrong way.

ubdai

Mojisola

No tiles or splash backs in your post - are you having any?

Any changes to the flooring?

What about appliances? Are you going to reuse all your old ones?

Having done a new kitchen last year, be prepared for some unexpected work once the kitchen is ripped out. Always have a contingency fund set by before you start.

ubdai

Mojisola wrote: »

No tiles or splash backs in your post - are you having any?

Any changes to the flooring?

What about appliances? Are you going to reuse all your old ones?

Having done a new kitchen last year, be prepared for some unexpected work once the kitchen is ripped out. Always have a contingency fund set by before you start.

Fitter is doing just the kitchen. Getting in separate trades for plastering, tiling and electrics. Quote did include new double gas oven and gas hob and sink with white goods being reused.
Any idea on comparison cost for a 600mm base unit from benchmarx, so I could then compare to the sheds.

ubdai

loracan1

Bear in mind I know nothing, but; £460 to plaster half a wall and one ceiling sounds a lot and nearly £5000 for B &Q to just 'fit' a kitchen? Is that really what it costs?:eek:

ubdai

loracan1 wrote: »

Bear in mind I know nothing, but; £460 to plaster half a wall and one ceiling sounds a lot and nearly £5000 for B &Q to just 'fit' a kitchen? Is that really what it costs?:eek:

Plastering cost was full ceiling, one full wall and 3walls from below worktop level upto ceiling. For my area the plastering quote is fine W. Essex & N.London others went upto £600.

Just the kitchen from B&Q was £4k and then £5k to fit.Why I don't know. But this now seems to be normal practice I believe.

Like I said earlier, I thought a kitchen fitter bought kitchen would have worked out slightly cheaper.



ubdai

Mojisola

The only people I know who had kitchens fitted by B&Q had nightmare experiences. It may be that they both were unlucky but one couple were without a functioning kitchen for six months because of problems.

Steve_the_fitter

As said if you decide to go for one of the above kitchens Benckmarx is better than the rest. You say you are getting in different trades yourself. Why is this? The kitchen fitter should be able to help your source all the trades you need and I imagine the fit would run much smoother.

Kitchen_fitter

I joined the forum recently and have posted a few replies that may be helpful. In this case look at Cut price Kitchens for you kitchen and worktops etc as they are the same as Tesco and Wickes but much cheaper. Good local trades can be found on Trust a trader and other trusted trader sites and if you are fairly organised you can use local trades and get a better job done for a lot less money. You may be able to save the VAT on the labour as a lot of small businesses don't charge VAT if theri turnover on labour isn't too high

Cambridge32

My whole kitchen, including Cooke & Lewis B&Q units, new floor, tiling, complete plastering, wiring, appliances cost ~ £10,000. Your fitter will be charging about 1/2-1/3 what the big places will charge you for fitting, so get the best units that you can afford.

The plastering sounds a little steep and B&Q fitting charges are ridiculous, so always use your own trusted fitter. B&Q will price-match appliances though. B&Q mis-sold us our kitchen installation so did half of it for free (we paid £2000 for half fitting essentially but were under the impression that we were getting all of the units, appliances and worktops etc. installed too). They were very helpful in the end though.

Homebase stuff is nice but prohibitively expensive in my experience.