Sorry: here's the link to the house ad and plan. Clicking it will make various parts bigger.

Here is a link that might be useful:

Your house looks adorable from the picture in the catalog page.

I am curious though how renters are going to treat original hardwood flooring. I am envisioning all sorts of abuse from water spills to vaccuuming the wood with a beater bar vaccuum.

It seems like some of your surfaces are rather delicate for renters unless your house will fall into the high end rental market and they treat things better than the average renter.

I've only heard horror story after horror story about what renters do to houses, so based on that, I would be putting in vinyl floor, Formica counter, and the cheapest Home Depot stock cabinets or something off Craigslist with plans to replace it all once I moved in for myself.

I'd check the local rental laws. In some places, rental units are required to have a waterproof floor in the kitchen and bath.

needsometips and riverspots

These are good points. The house is in a very pleasant but not hugely up-market area area and three blocks from a subway stop. I have experience with managing a handful of rental apartments, but this will be the first house. I am toying with the idea of setting a bit below market rate for the rent but asking for a larger-than-usual security deposit as an incentive for good behavior.

Right now, I have to meld the the appliances and cabinets I have into something that is attractive but can be refinished, repaired, or scratch-covered with relative ease.

Think about who you are renting to. Families with kids, college students, 20 somethings, etc?

I have a duplex, one apartment has all hardwood, the other has berber carpeting in the living and dining room. When renting the "carpet" apartment so many won't even come to look at it when they hear its not all hardwood. To be specific the kitchen and bath has tile look laminate. Our target renters are 20 somethings so we tailor to that group for our area.

Think about your target group and make decisions to attract the best of that group. Look at other apartments in the area to see what others are doing.

I hope someone will post pictures of kitchens with black appliances and light cabniets for you. That is what I have and the laminate counter and bar are light too. I also would love some examples from all these creative people.

I vote for laminate counters and a floating sheet vinyl floor or vinyl plank. Renters are hard on stuff because it's just not theirs. And no amount of security deposit will help if they do significant damage to those original wood floors.

When you move in, or before you decide to sell, pull up the vinyl.

"archaic pickled maple -- with an eye to painting them a creamish or sagey color. I am not, however, finding any photos of small kitchens with black appliances and light cabinets that do not look a bit scary."

Sorry to be a downer, and just my opinion, but I think there's a reason you haven't found any good-looking pictures like that...

My suggestion would be to decide (admit?) that you can do EITHER the light-painted cabinets OR the black appliances, but not both, which leaves you with two options:

A - Continue to scour Craigslist for both cabinets and appliances, replacing whichever option is easiest to replace and reselling the other set on Craigslist. Could even be money-neutral... (Though white appliances would also not be the best with creme & sage, and *matching* bisque could be exceedingly difficult to locate.)

B - Find a darker color paint and add more electric lights. Small rooms done in dark colors can be wonderfully cozy if they're well-lit. A good lighting plan and a great color scheme could be all you need to make it work. For colors, I'd look at a deep teal, possibly a rich barn red, maybe a deep olive green, or even a distressed black. You could go with dark paint on the base cabinets and cream-painted uppers -- vintage, up-to-date, and black-appliance-friendly.

I like your butcher block countertop idea and think that could be fabulous. A slate-look laminate could also work well, and is very Sharpie-friendly for repairs.

Thanks, Sweeby: I needed that!!!!! "Admit" is the right verb; I was wistfully longing for boxerpups or some other photo magician to come up with a solution that had simply eluded me, even though I should have known better.

In consonance with your suggestion, I am prone to look at a dark taupe with black counters (see link). I can envision this working in natural or artificial light and in both summer and winter. The exact taupe might be a function of what color the floors turn out, and the possibility of lighter upper cabinets would be a function of the wall color, which which will have to extend into the dining room.

I think this muted palette is pretty versatile. It can be popped with turquoise, red, orange, or it can be kept cool with natural stone.

If you are inclined to tell me what you think, I would be most grateful.

In any case, I cannot thank you enough for your candor, clear thinking, and ability to visualize how things will fit together, as well as the time you gave.

Cheers.

P.S. for secondlouise: As you can tell, I think Sweeby is absolutely right about the potential of black appliances working with white or cream cabinets. Good luck to you and I hope you will post your progress.

Here is a link that might be useful: taupe with black

I had rentals with hardwood flooring, and by making it perfectly clear on interview and lease how to take care of them ... I had no problems. You wipe ip spille with a damp cloth and vacuum the dust. Easy.

properly finished and with a good coat of wax they arr hard to damage. A vacuum with a beater bar does nothing to them.

Although this does not help with your question, I had a friend who rented her house while on a 2 year sabatical in Europe. Although her tenants were what one would consider good prospects (doctors), they did not do any yard work and really no housekeeping.
She said if she ever did that again she would charge more for rent and include a maid service and a lawn service (every 2 weeks).
Not sure if that is acceptable in your area but maybe the lawn service would be worthwhile?
Just something to consider.....
Good luck!

I have rentals from college students to retirees. I agree with lazygardens that hardwood in the kitchen is fine if you have a great finish and the right tenants (never college students). It appears it can take more abuse than the laminate in my rentals. Laminate tiles are cheap and quick too but can look worn in a few years (again, depending on the tenant). Tile flooring for me can take the most abuse and not show it.

As someone previously said, determine your target rental group and set the kitchen tone with that. Check out a few other rental houses in the area. Now I only list on craigslist. 10 times more responses and better quality tenants than from the local paper. It's free and easy. You can see the other local rentals there too with pics.

Since this is not a high end market laminate countgertops (Wilson Art at HD) is great and cheap. Get something with a few colors in it so you can't see cuts, etc. I have white cabinets in one apartment and I would never do that again. Yes, it's low end HD but it always looks dirty and worn (vs. darker or stained cabinets). Darker cabinets and appliances will make it look darker but go with light laminate flooring, light paint color, light countertops and good lighting and it will make a difference. And remember - don't go too crazy since this is a rental (and you're going to charge below market rent)

Also, MA state law says you cannot take a security deposit more than one months's rent. Not sure of the laws in your state.

doctors are too busy to do yardwork and housekeeping unless you have a SAH spouse. Obviously, the tenants did not hire help.

We include yard service in our rent. Over the years, we moved to this. It is not worth having a terrible yard. The prospective tenants want to decrease the cost of rent but we are firm on this.

Vinyl and laminates are the good choices for rental. It is easy/cheap to replace if damaged. You need to consider the cost and time required for replacement. the longer the work takes, the longer it is out of the rental market.

however, you also need to know the market and target for that. Good luck.

That's such a great house! Love the big front porch and deep eaves.

Most of the white cabinet/black appliance kitchen pictures I found looked quite contemporary and wouldn't fit with the style of your house. But I like the taupe color you found, and several other colors would look good too. Here are a few below; the top one I mocked up with black appliances so you could see how it looks:

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Your pictures have opened up a new set of options, chicagoans. All the colors are great.

I love the stone green and -- although the kitchen will have just a range -- the bulk of the wall ovens in the photo give me a sense of how manageable the bulk of the fridge can be made visually, which one of my major concerns.

The doorless corner uppers in the first blue kitchen gives me a good alternative to open shelving, which I was planning to use so things won't feel so closed in.

This has made me much more sanguine about moving forward (which is good, because my contractor just told me his guys had brought all the kitchen cabinets into the living and dining rooms so that he could install the new garage door). Thank you so much.

Highjacking to a slightly different tack here,
The ad boasts of how efficient the original kitchen is, saying how most of the action is very close to dining room. The refrigerator space is to the left of the sink area. BUT..
The sink is in a corner, the two work surfaces not connected with dishwashing--the work table and the baking center--are across the room, and the work triangle requires travel to two different walls across a decided walkpath from dining room to back of house so there is guaranteed collisions in all directions. It must have been designed by a man. Despite the claims of good design, this is a difficult design that traps the sink user into a corner with her fanny in the walkpath and puts the refrigerator in the way of the walk also, but at least tradesmen and icemen will not be interfering in the kitchen any farther than the refrigerator. Unless the range is a woodstove and a hired kid hauls wood--stand back! and demand that he wipe his feet!

Good eye, florantha.

I suspect that indoor plumbing was seen as a mod con by some of the people who bought and built this model house, but I would have found the kitchen difficult.

We are having to replumb the kitchen to put the sink below the back window and the dishwasher next to it. Unfortunately, although the original sink w/ drainboard was still there when I bought the house, the high backsplash on it made reglazing and repositioning below the window impossible.

Chicagoans' first picture is great! Shows how a 'grayed down' tone could work. Or maybe something with a very sheer, very dark glaze?

Here are a few pictures I found of black appliances & painted cabinets. In general, they look better than I thought...

Gee, sweeby, you are going to usher in The Great Black Cabinet Renaissance if you don't curb your enthusiasm.

I am actually pretty smitten with chicagoan's first pic myself, in part because of the color but also because it is of a scale with the kitchen I am trying to get going. I am more than ever convinced that only muted or dark cabinets will keep the effect of a high ratio of appliance vertical surface to cabinet vertical surface in a small kitchen from creating a disconcerting color block effect.

This has been a really helpful exercise. I am so grateful that people are willing to offer advice for even so modest a project.

It seems to me that for the most part these forums exemplify communitarian spirit, which is way cool. Thanks to all.