The idea for remodel started when Venkat visited last winter and suggested a few updates to the kitchen. At that point we weren’t thinking of the remodel but his ideas were exciting and that got us thinking more.

So I visited the Seattle Home Show website (since the show was already over by then) and picked up a dozen kitchen remodel vendor’s contact information. I started calling each one of them, asking if they would like to visit and give us a quote. As we talked to each one of them when they visited, we started refining our ideas and making adjustments as we went along. By the end, we had 6 bids and a clear plan in our head.

The bids were all over the board: the most expensive bid twice as much as the lowest – believe it or not. We were going to add a couple of cabinets so visiting a local Ikea and Home Depot revealed that the existing cabinets were Mills Pride from Home Depot. This dramatically cut down our cost since some of the contractors had estimated a hefty sum just to match the new cabinets to the old.

At the time we sought bids, we hadn’t decided whether to install an overhead hood or a downdraft. Also, we hadn’t decided whether to install a cooktop gas stove or a slide-in range. As time went by, we finalized on a slide-in range with a vent hood.

We used a couple of criteria for selecting contractors: Did the contractor seem down to earth and willing to help us reduce our costs, or are they trying to milk us for money? Does the contractor’s bid seem reasonable? Did they accurately estimate what we discussed or did they throw in some extras that unnecessarily cost us money? Did they have a brick and mortar walk-in showroom? Do their past clients vouch the contractor?

Based on these criteria, we have selected Home Expressions as our contractor.