Big, Big Problems with remodel!!!! (long)
The kitchen was demo'd to the studs, even the subfloor was removed. When the floor was laid it was determined that if we leveled it to match the new concrete slab in the mudroom addition, we'd raise one end of the room so much that the tall cabinets at that end might not fit. So, at the suggestion of the GC, we didn't level the floor along the vertical. It turns out the real problem was that GC poured the slab too high for the small addition! He refuses to admit this and has told his BS story so many times I think he really believes it now. Ok. Too late to do anything about that now since the mudroom is built.
Back to the kitchen. New hardwood floor was installed, then cabinets. It turns out that the floor is so out of level and mostly over a small distance, that the sink and dishwasher will be 1" higher than normal and the peninsula will be 2" higher!!!! I'm only 5'4" and love lower counters. My GC has no concept how an inch or even a half inch can throw everything out of kilter. So what am I to do. The biggest problem is that the range at it's lowest is 35" and it sits at the highest part of the kithcen. Here are what I see as my only choices.
1) Raise the leg with the range to 36.5" and lower the other leg to 35"(by cutting down the first cabinet to the left of the sink). The legs of the L would then be overlapping with the leg with the range higher than the leg with the sink.
2)Lower the range wall to 35" by cutting down those cabinets and keep everything as level as possible.
3) Uninstall the cabinets, rip out the floor and make it more level. I believe we could shave an inch off the existing joists as they are enormous (100 yr old house). This would cost about $5K plus whatever the price to reinstall the cabs would be.
This is a very expensive remodel and the cabinets are custom from Kennebec. I don't really want to cut them down. I'm leaning toward replacing the new floor. There have been so many large disappointments in the course of this remodel I feel like I'm compromised out! We are spending so much money and want it to be right and I don't think 38" high cabs at one end of the kitchen achieves what's right. My contractor keeps whining about how hard it is when everything is out of level and square. Well, what the heck was the point of taking it down to the studs....why isn't it square and at least somewhat level??? What would you do? Anyone have a better solution?
Comments (19)
rosema12
15 years agorhome410
15 years agoRelated Discussions
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15 years agocheri127
15 years agopositano
15 years agoalice462
15 years agoMaria410
15 years agoI live in a 90 YO home and we have all kinds of plumb and level problems. I have a fabulous contractor who thinks through all these issues very carefully. He never does anything until we are comfortable and approve the "fix." He previously owned a machine shop and likes things very straight and level. When we took out the dining room wall, the floors were not level. The dining room is higher by 3/8ths of an inch because there is a parquet wood floor laid on top of a regular floor. This is also true in the center hall and living room. We have stepped over these rises for the last seven years so we decided to do the same in the open kitchen / dining room. We also had level changes along the edges of the rooms due to uneven settling -- the center of the long wall was the highest point and the right edge of the back short wall was the lowest point. My contractor spent three days figuring out the best approach and had many conversations with DH and me. In the end we did nothing to the floors (I couldn't afford and didn't want a rip out). He raised some of the cabinets and we decided that the cabinets to the left of the range would be higher than those on the left. Even with that he shaved the cabinets on the left side.
My suggestion is to take it very carefully and check with an engineer possibly before shaving floor joists. That could be a very expensive mistake. In my previous "old" home the engineer recommended sloping the floor instead of touching anything below the subfloor. We had a much greater change in heights there.
Here are some pictures that show the different heights of our two counters.
This photos shows how the floors were repaired where the wall was removed.
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