In article . com, Chuck wrote:
We are planning to redo our kitchen in a year or two. We'll be doing
most of it ourselves, including building the cabinets. I have been
building my skills and my tool collection and think I am just about
ready for this task. We have remodeled another kitchen in the past
using ready made cabinets.

I have one big question though. I'm not sure if it's cost effective to
build my own cabinets or to go out and buy some decent quality ready
made ones.

It depends how you value your time. If you put any kind of
realistic price on an hour of your labor it's exceedingly
unlikely that you can save any money compared to simply
buying some good quality cabinets.

Although cabinets are a major item, that only one of many
items to be addressed when completely remodeling a kitchen.
Personally, I would take the view that my time and skills
would be better invested in other aspects of the overall
project. Items that you can't buy ready-made, off-the-shelf.

And even in the case of the cabinets, you might consider
buying some more basic cabinets and enhancing them. For
example, my own home came with some very solid cabinets
with really crappy interiors. I've recently had some fun
lining them with laminate to provide easy-to-clean inside
surfaces.

Of course, if you REALLY want to make the things, go ahead
and do it. But also consider what you might be able to
accomplish with all that time to create an even nicer
kitchen. Trust me, if you're going the gut the existing
kitchen there will be plenty of scope to deploy your
energy and craftsmanship even if you buy ready made
cabinets ;-)

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