I think repairing the floor is going to take some $$ so you may find that you need to paint the cabs you have and put the money in flooring. You could hire a local Handyman (call your independent hardware stores and ask for referrals) to do a lot of the work. Lowes or HD can do the formica counters. I've used them on 3 different projects for formica counters and have been happy with the result. If you're not up to painting the cabinets, call your local paint store and again ask for referrals. Someone may want a small indoor job this time of the year.

I'm not sure if this is an option with HD brands but I know with Kraftmaid (Lowe's brand) you can pick and choose which cabinets have plywood sides to help save on cost. Any cabinets with exposed sides, sink base cabinet and cabinet next to the dishwasher are the best ones. Hope this helps.

I really thought just like lukkiirish about their contracting services and while I don't know what the outcome will be I have a a lot of confidence in the installer we are working with. First try with a HD on the other hand in addition to a less than stellar design we had someone who wouldn't be installing doing the site visit and measure - didn't sit well with me and I worried about accountability - if the HD has a contract with a large install service they don't know whose being hired or how competent s\he is and if I'm not happy it may just turn into a finger pointing exercise between HD and the sub-contractor and they will never resolve the problems. In our case (and obviously others) we know this installer has been working for them for years, he works for other HD's in the area and in fact worked for the HD we dealt with initially and stopped because they were not competent. I asked and he is paid based on the linear foot and the set charge fees not by the cost of the product we are buying. Would I buy my countertop from them? No. I can contract directly with the same place they work with and probably get it for less (just as lukkiirish points out). In our area the fabricator the HDs work with is expensive but the company I am working with was in fact recommended by another HD who have had more han a few problems with the fabricator they contract with and are now recommending this one on the sly to clients. In relation to the volume of business HD or Lowe's does the nightmare stories were not at anywhere near the frequency they would need to be for me to write them off all together without checking it out for myself. I was very very skittish and suspicious but they really met my conditions. You need to be hyper vigilant but then again from what I have read here you need to be with almost any company you would be working with. Again you can't assume that others'good or bad experiences (including mine)at a particular store are applicable to the one your working with. By the sounds of it the product is good and so is the price point so I would test the waters. No good KD is going to work at a store where everything else is bad - who needs the grief. My feeling is usually if it's bad it either all becomes bad (lowest common denominator) or the good people will push out the weak link. Just an opinion.

I heard they are closing 2 of their 11 plants. I would highly doubt they are going out of business.