Thanks for your input, ineffablespace. The timing coordination is definitely my biggest concern. The GC I used for my recent bathroom remodel hired sub contractors that were less than optimal. One was fired while working on my project due to his lack of professionalism. The GC himself was great but also quite expensive.

Do you have the patience for the project to drag on 2-3x longer? The flexible time to be there at 7 am, then again at 11 when there is another issue to be decided, and again at 3 when the decision is being serving guessed by a trade who wasn't on site at 11?

Do you have enough construction knowledge to be able to sequence trades correctly and to be able to do quality control?

Do you have the ability to mediate disputes between trades? The ability to know who might be right or wrong on a point of conflict between different approaches to a technical question?

And finally, are you OK with making some mistakes that will cost you money because you don't know what you don't know, even if you have a lot of DIY experience?

Good points, live_wire_oak. I certainly have the time. Unfortunately I do not possess much knowledge about construction and the like.

Daisy - If you have the time and a patient, organized disposition I say go for it! I handled my kitchen remodel a few years ago and it went very well. I hired an electrician, plumber, drywall guy, demo guy, tiler, custom cabinet shop, and granite fabricator. It took me a lot of planning upfront and I created a project schedule to work from (I talked with all the trades to see what their timeframes for their part of the work was to help me create the schedule). All the trades knew what days/weeks they were needed (I shared my schedule with them when I awarded them the work) and I was fortunate not to have any major delays with any of them. I also built in extra time on the schedule to account for delays. I had two glitches, one with the tiler and one with the fabricator but we worked them out. You need to be prepared to discuss any problems with the trade person. I am very detailed and like to be in control when I am spending so much money so it never occurred to me to even look at a GC. It is A LOT of work though but I had a lot of fun with it. Good luck on whatever you decide!

We GC'd our kitchen and master bath remodel in our previous home. What we had going for us, however, were two things that made it possible - 1) my husband knows a ton about construction. In previous houses, he's done tiling, completely plumbed a new bathroom, and electrical work. He's even rehung cabinets that were hung badly by a seemingly drunk installer. Our current GC is awed by his knowledge. , 2) we had a terrific carpenter who served sort of as a foreman. We hired the subs,but Charlie was onsite every day to work with them as needed. I think it would be an impossible task if you don't have construction know-how.

I was my own GC, using a local cabinet maker. He has his own installer, he recommended his favorite electrician, and he ordered the countertop. I have a friend who is a contractor, and he did the small amount of drywall work I needed. I did my own painting. I hired the flooring installer, and didn't need any plumbing other than faucet and garbage disposal installation at the end. I ordered all the components except the cabinets themselves - sink, faucet, range hood, pulls.

I had two periods of down time. The first was when the cabinet maker had an equipment malfunction at the shop, which delayed the construction of the cabinets by 2 weeks. Then there was a 3 week delay between templating and Cambria installation. Neither would have been any shorter if I had a GC.

Maybe I'm really lucky, but the process went smoothly for me.

Our remodel is somewhat of a hybrid. We found our own:
1.) cabinet maker
2.) granite fabricator
3.) hardwood flooring people

Our GC will take care of the demo, prepping subfloor, electrical, insulation, drywall, cabinetry and appliance installation, plumbing, and tile...all of these things he and his crew does himself - they don't hire out - one of his guys on the crew is a registered electrician, so he doesn't have to sub that out.

Even with the limited number of people that I have to line up, it has been a pain trying to keep everything together. And, yes, it's likely that it's taking a bit more time than it would have with someone doing this turn-key for us, but not a lot more time than we anticipated.

In the end, the people that we picked outside of the GC were things that we needed a bit more "specialized" and we really wouldn't have saved money hiring separate people for each aspect of the job based on the various things that we priced out individually.

Another point to make: If you are an amateur kitchen designer rather than an experienced professional, it will be difficult to envision the entire kitchen design in advance. If you are your own GC, you have the options to go slowly, to make changes, and to see the completion of part of the project before you commit to the next step.

You can save somewhere between 10 to 20% by doing it yourself. If your time is less valuable than that, go for it!
...and have fun learning what the GC found out in all the years he has been in business ;)

Our kitchen was just completed a little before Christmas. We did not go with a GC since we were on such a tight budget. We initially tried to go with one but we couldn't afford one. We had 3 contractors come to our home and give us quotes. They all differed in price, one was almost double in price. We figured since our kitchen was so small and no major walls being knocked down or added we could do it ourselves. Yes, it was stressful, but I love my kitchen and there is no way that we would have been able to afford the kitchen that I have now if we would have gone with a GC. We told all of the GC that came
what our budget was and they all admitted to us that we were going to get the very basics in cabinets and an inexpensive counter.

We got brave, did our research (thank you GardenWeb) and took the plunge. The entire kitchen was demolished and in a little over 2 months I had my kitchen. My husband did the painting and the flooring. I used Yelp to hire a plumber and the granite guy, and my brother in-law did the electrical. My girlfriend recommended the cabinet maker who did a beautiful job but did give me the run around for a few weeks after he cashed my check. Yes, coordination of timing isn't going to work like all of the contractors tell you they will. Something is bound to happen like it did to us for every single contractor we hired. The cabinet guy was off by about 3 weeks, plumber screwed up and took 1 week to fix problem. Fabricator cracked our granite during installation.
The one thing that I recommend if you do go without a GC is to make sure everyone you hire has a license. I know some people that try to go the cheap route and hire a handyman, but it just gave me peace of mind that everyone that we hired had a license and when issues happened they were corrected.

People on this website are so helpful if you have questions, which are bound to come up. I'd post a question and by the next day they were answered.

My husband and I work full time but my boss was pretty good when I had to be at home waiting for contractors to finish a job, which sometimes took most of the day.

Here is my kitchen that I'm proud to say that I helped designed.

DaisyTN:

It depends.

It depends on your level of construction knowledge and how much you value your time.

Remember, even the smallest mistake can be nearly catastrophic. Let's say you layout your cabinets, and have them, the countertops, and splash installed. You install your drawer pulls but realize that you now can't get your adjacent drawers or dishwasher open (they strike the other pulls) because you didn't know to put filler strips in the corners.

You don't get to just go back and install the fillers. You may be out of wall space. Either way, your countertops are all wrong now too. You're in deep trouble.

This is just one small example of the price of not knowing what you don't know.

And nothing against those who have GC'd on their own, but pretty pictures do not a code-compliant remodel make. Probably the worst installations I see are done by those with a little bit of knowledge. Some are smart enough to know that they're in over their head and call a pro. Some know that they're experienced enough to do it themselves. It's the in-betweener's that get in big trouble. Look inward honestly and make your decision.

After thinking about it last night, I decided I will hire a GC. If something went terribly wrong, it would likely end up costing me more in the long run than just paying a GC from the beginning of the project. I thank you all for your insights. This is a great forum!

Daisy, where in TN are you? I might have some recommendations of folks to interview if you are close to me here in Memphis.

You don't get to just go back and install the fillers. You may be out of wall space.

Of course, even contractors make mistakes, but then they get to fix it! Out plans called for a panel and filler between the refrigerator and the dishwasher, to support the countertop over the dishwasher. When we got home the first night, there seemed to be way too much space "left over" at the other end of the cabinet run. We realized they had left out the panel and filler, so everything was shifted 1-1/2" to the right of where it should have been. Next day, they removed 5 cabinets, installed the filler and reinstalled the same 5 cabinets. PITA and a huge time-suck, but at least we realized it before the appliances were in.

sjhokeyfan, who noticed the mistake ... you or the general contractor? When you have to come home and check all their work, then customers really do need to KNOW "what they don't know"!

sjhockeyfan:

Yours is the perfect example of what I'm talking about. If you hadn't noticed before the top went in, that section of top would have been too short after the panel and filler were installed. If your tops were stone and there wasn't a matching piece long enough available, it's possible that even the tops that were right would have to be replaced to match.

My wife trims my hair occasionally, but she's an electrician by trade not a barber. Folks who would never consider performing their own root canal seem to think there is nothing to remodeling. A bad haircut never killed anyone, but several people die every year, mostly infants, from asphyxiation from improperly vented plumbing pipes or electrical fires.

We don't have codes to be mean or as common myth here, to raise municipal revenue. Codes save lives. They don't build 'em like they used to. Thank God they don't.

This post was edited by Trebruchet on Sun, Jan 5, 14 at 16:52

live_wire_oak, I'm in Knoxville. Friends of ours just had a large kitchen/dining remodel job completed and they passed along the contact info for their GC. Everyone's insight is invaluable. I truly appreciate it.

I agree with all the comments about time and sequencing of trades. That has been our biggest problem. Biggest positive aspect is that the kitchen is truly the way I wanted it - all mistakes are my mistakes. Good design is my good design, etc. The designer/finishing touches have been quite difficult for me but I'm mostly happy.
Not sure I saved money. May have cost more money.
Biggest issue for me has been confronting workmen when I think they have made a mistake or when they misunderstood my directions. (Try to put all directions in email or at least on paper). I don't think my personality is a good fit for this type of job, no matter how good the workers.

We are coming down to the end. Our electrician who I like very much is slowing us down because of side projects he has. If I had it to do it over again, I think I would not be my own GC. I didn't get much help from my husband and all workers, no matter how nice seem to get to a "burnout phase" as they work on your project and they are ready to move on and the quality of their work begins to diminish greatly, no matter how good. That has been our experience, anyway. I think a GOOD GC would have kept workers in line better but then I wouldn't say I'm 100% confident that was true. Good luck. I think it's a crap shoot which ever way you go. May depend on what part of the country. Here in Texas on the Gulf Goast, good quality labor is in high demand so be prepared to wait in line for anyone good.

I forget the exact quote but it's something similar to, do you want it good, fast or cheap....you can only pick two bc you won't get the third.

I went with good and cheap. Lol. It went relatively smooth but technically still isn't done (needs a backsplash). One thing I can say is YOU have to be there to see what's going on. Not your mom, or your sibling, our your spouse who lets you make all design decisions (Good bless his little heart). YOU.

I disagree that going without a GC will add alot of time. I was my own GC, and hired a Cabinet Maker, plumber, electrician and granite people. I work from home which allowed me to be on site, and that's the only benefit I could see a GC bringing here. I used Angies List and other sources for recommendations on the various people and got alot of quotes for each.

My wife and I demoed the kitchen and patched/painted the walls ourselves. Then the rest of the work was completed over the course of one week. You do have to be persistent with any person/company working on any project, but it's totally doable. We saved a TON also, as we were able to pick the best of the best people and get the best prices.

One of the issues with self GCing is scope creep. "We're not paying a GC's overhead, so we can add in the finished end panels to the cabinets." "We're not paying a GC, so we an afford the exotic granite,". Pretty soon, all of your savings has been spent, and then you run into issues like every remodel of an older home does, and you don't have the money to address them so you have to put stuff on a charge card. Or, you do have the money, but it now has to come from savings. And that 30K remodel that would have cost you 40K with a GC has now cost you 45K and you're not done yet!

General contractors stay in business because they bring value to a remodeling job, not because they add unnecessary expenses to it.

There's always a risk/reward tradeoff which no one can escape.

For most of these wonderful kitchens I see on the site, I think a GC is probably necessary--so much detail and so much precision and elegance in the finish. On the other hand, it is a lot of FUN to do it yourself. You just have to be willing to live with your mistakes.