The 2nd is nicer. I like a sturdy looking edge around the fridge, but it doesn't have to be that thick, and I do like the space around the Velos, too. I like the wood...Looks warmer and less stark...But that's partly the computer rendering which is visually stronger than real life. I wouldn't choose on looks, though, but by how hard you use it and how it is to maintain under your family's particular circumstances and cleaning style. If it looks great, but is a pain to keep looking nice, I'd tire of it in a hurry. I'm not saying which of your 2 options would be better in that way, just saying that's where I'd start in choosing the right material.

An Advantium has a hard time with a full sized chicken. It can do a small "spring" type chicken, but the larger roasting chickens won't fit. It would die in fright if you showed it a 1/4 turkey. It is in no way a substitute for a real oven. You won't be doing a meatloaf in there, because of the amount of smoke and the heavy cleanup required. You won't be doing cakes or baking either. A pan of brownies, or couple of frozen biscuits, sure. But no real baking. If you need those tasks to be done, then a countertop convection oven is your choice for that. And, it won't fit a turkey. A wall oven of any kind cannot be positioned over a cooktop. Period. Stop. Go directly to jail after your home burns down! You can have a Over The Range MicrowWave (OTR MW) over a cooktop, as long as it has the proper clearances. It is designed (and certified by UL) to be able to handle the heat of the cooktop. The Advantium comes in such a configuration and I own one---mounted under a regular cabinet because it's fan isn't remotely adequate or quiet. If you decide it has a usable capacity for it's trouble and you can modify the cabinetry for it's needed clearances, it is a possibiity for you to get you through until a real remodel can be in the works. You are getting some dangerous and incorrect advice regarding the electrical in your home. If you do choose a 220 Advantium version, you cannot "split" the current 220 that serves your range module. It will have to be an all new 4 wire (NOT 3 wire) circuit from your electrical box to the spot where you want to add the oven. Even if you go with a 110 version, you will need an all new dedicated 110 outlet. It cannot be on the same circuit as anything else. You cannot run wire by just laying it across upper cabinets! That's highly dangerous! All wire has to be behind walls or in an approved protective conduit. No lines can be "extended" unless in proper accessible junction boxes. And you cannot extend a current 220 line at all because the NEC has changed and 4 wire circuits are now required instead of the old 3 wire ones. It's lucky that you have an electrician in the family, but that doesn't mean that you shouldn't still make sure he is licensed and insured for your own sake. And he should also pull the proper permits to work on the home. That can come back to bite you big time down the road. Um, and I have to say that there isn't a single contractor on the face of the earth that can redo a kitchen in 3 days. Even with working teams around the clock and having all kinds of production interns at their beck and call, they can't even do that on a HGTV show. It's unrealistic. And worse, it's dangerous. Any contractor that can tell you this with a straight face, even if they are family, is telling you a big fat lie. The rewiring and drywall work alone will take over a week to accomplish! And you are dealing with some issues that are going to need a lot of creative soutions. I'd expect your reno to take at least 3 months if not a year---because family is involved. That usually slows things down rather than speeds them up because your work is always on the back burner to them taking other jobs. You can have a quality job. You can have a cheap job. You can have a fast job. Pick two. You cannot have all three.

Huango, just returning to your basic comments, I often see and comment on kitchens that become large out of proportion to the rest of the house. It's a common phenomenon among the TKO'd. Often but not necessarily a mistake, but always something that needs to be done with great insight into the gains and losses and a commitment to living with them for decades if it comes to that. People's lifestyles, needs, and interests change as they do, and their homes still need to work for them. Regarding: "We are the first house into a LARGE neighborhood of very expensive homes, so we could never renovate beyond our neighborhood value." Dead wrong, and you do need to know that. Has your agent friend explained that yet? Future buyers will compare your entire property to their alternatives. The most glorious kitchen in your state would not significantly increase the value of you property if it was inadequate in other ways compared to alternatives. As an appraiser in Los Angeles, I can't remember all the really, really NICE homes that became--literally--teardowns because their neighborhoods developed with homes different (I don't say necessarily better, though almost always a lot bigger) from what they could offer. That's because, typically, almost all the increased value of a property as a neighborhood skyrockets in value is actually in the land--not the house on it. In any case, any time you're looking more than a handful of months ahead, you have to assume style changes will turn your glorious new tile, or even today's perfect layout, into a cause for buyer dissatisfaction that would have to be "fixed." This is especially the case in affluent neighborhoods where people have become accustomed to updating their homes the way they used to just update their wardrobes, or trade in the 2-year-old for a newer model car.

We looked at the electric service before purchasing. It seems fine so far. Will see once we really get in there. I really like the space in the kitchen. Not sure what to do with the island. There is too much space in between *not* to have one, but it's stupid. I hadn't thought about enclosing the fridge. That should be easy to do. I've read all the stuff about not updating for resale, but we paid less for this house due to the lack of upgrades. Other homes in the area almost all have granite and better flooring, and none have coil ranges. Hopefully, we'll be smart about how to update this so it fits our family, and so that we don't lose any money at the end of the road. Our area is still seeing increases in home values at a pretty rapid rate, though I know that could change at any moment.