# Kitchen Cabinet Suggestions + General Kitchen Suggestions



## ffmariners (Aug 6, 2010)

Hi, I'm a first time home buyer. Just moved in to my house in May. Right when I moved in I started to travel for work until a few weeks ago. Now that I'm not traveling, I have time to put into making the house look better.

When I bought the house, the realtor said that the kitchen was one of the biggest issues people were citing as to why they wanted to keep looking. (Attached 3 pictures of the kitchen as it was when I was looking.)

Since then, I was lucky enough to cash in on the (realtor paid for) home warranty and get a new range/hood, as you will see. I am currently in the process of shopping for a Stainless LOOK fridge to match the other appliances (only the hood is real stainless, the range and dishwasher are look). That old fridge will be out, soon. I also replaced all the cabinet hardware from gold to silver the other day.

Looking past that:

1) Should I paint my cabinets? What color? Or should I stain them? Leave them alone? I like the yellow walls, it isn't overly bright and makes the room very bright and happy. I rarely use the lights because of all the natural lighting.

2) Should I change the countertops or do they look nice enough?

3) Is there any way to mess with the cabinets above the range and fridge? It seems they built the cabinets to how big the average appliances were back in the 80s. This is a two-fold problem. 1) It is placing a big constraint on fridge choice as the max height is about 66 inches. 2) I'd love to replace the hood with an OTR microwave and free up the counterspace where the big ol late 90's white microwave is currently sitting. But because of the cabinets there would only be around 14" between the microwaves bottom and the range grills.

Any other general design suggestions? I'm new at this and a pretty design stupid guy!

Thanks!
Frank


EDIT: First 3 Images are when I was house shopping. Notice the old lady drapes


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## ffmariners (Aug 6, 2010)

And the other images beyond the 6 pic limit.


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## BronzeGenius (Aug 12, 2010)

ffmariners said:


> Hi, I'm a first time home buyer. Just moved in to my house in May. Right when I moved in I started to travel for work until a few weeks ago. Now that I'm not traveling, I have time to put into making the house look better.
> 
> When I bought the house, the realtor said that the kitchen was one of the biggest issues people were citing as to why they wanted to keep looking. (Attached 3 pictures of the kitchen as it was when I was looking.)
> 
> ...


i actually like everything as it is, why do you want to change it ?


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## framerman (Mar 30, 2008)

Ditch the brick, get new appliances and a granite countertops. Maybe ditch the valance. If you want to go further, look into cabinet refacing and new doors. Those cabinets look pretty good though.


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