We put in the electric mats in the bathrooms, so it didn't matter whether or not the basement was unfinished. From your post, it sounds like you're interested in hydronic radiant heat, which I didn't look into.

How are you heating the rest of the kitchen? We decided *not* to put radiant heat in the kitchen though, because we have a toekick heater that provides plenty of heat. Once the cooktop, oven, heat from the fridge are going, it is really unnecessary.

What I think I want is slippers though, because tile floor barefoot is *HARD* after standing on it for a couple of hours.

Actually, I am thinking electric. Any thoughts on the cost for a 14 by 17 room?

The house will have a two-zone forced air HVAC (furnace for main level and basement and heat pump for upstairs). I am just concerned that since the basement will be unheated, it will make the kitchen particularly cold.

Your basement shouldn't be completely unheated...you have pipes down there! Most basements have at least a couple of heat registers...usually in the ceiling.

I can't help you on cost since we put down a tile floor w/o heat. It was great this summer...a cool floor on our feet! Don't know for certain about the winter...we've had our floor since February and did walk on it some (and it was fine), but we didn't have a kitchen until June to work in so I don't know how it is working/standing on it for awhile in the winter. (We live in MD so our climate is basically the same.)

You might check the Flooring Forum. They will almost certainly have more information about this.

Here is a link that might be useful: Flooring Forum

Our master bath is over our unfinished "basement"...it's just the space underneath the house; piles of dirt and concrete pilings, so no insulation of any kind. The tile floor is COLD, the shower is cold the whole place is freezing in the (mercfiully short) winters. I live in FL, but in an area that can see 20 degree weather in Dec and Jan. I really wish I had the foresight to install heat under the floors!

We used the electic mats when we finished a guest bath in our basement two years ago. I am in VA too. A 5x7 mat with the controllable thermostat and shipping was about $500. We had wanted to do the mats under all of the basement flooring but the cost was just too high. If we ever build again, I think I would definitely do the pex tubes with a boiler and just stain the concrete over it. Our main floor is much warmer now that we have finished the basement.

We ordered ours here....

Here is a link that might be useful: warm your floors

I was going to say about a thousand, given the cost of doing our 6x6 family bathroom (using the mats and a thermostat). We're above a crawl space, much like kidshop's situation. I walk into that bath and sigh with great affection every second because the wood floors in the main part of that level are a bit cold (and we can't have any carpets until the freaking puppy is better trained).

I wish I'd have done it in my master bath, which is also travertine. It's warmer here, but in the winter, we have lots of windows and it does get a bit chilly....It was dumb not to. Don't be sorry....I'd cut out other things or save them for later if my budget required for the infloor radient heating. It's wonderful in chilly spaces!

If you DIY the electric mats, it's about $10-$20 a square foot, depending on which brand you use and how you plan your installation. Don't forget to plan for a setback thermostat. If you have to pay to have it installed, it's about $50 a square foot +. This is NOT a "heating" system. It's a floor warming system only. What it will cost to operate will depend on your electric rates. In areas of the country where TVA electric is inexpensive, maybe $10-$15 a month extra.

Update on the tile floor...today was cold (high 45o, currently 37o) and OK, most of the kitchen floor is cold! There are a couple of warm spots...along the heat duct path to the kitchen register and the path to the MBR heat.

I guess it's a good thing I like to wear slippers in the winter!

Is it too late to put in a floor warming system? :- 0

The pricing for the electric radiant heat kind of depends on how many twists and turns you have. The way it works is it comes on a large roll, which gets cut each time a turn is necessary. If you have a lot of turns, you may need more material. Also, you don't have coverage in areas where the cabinets/island are. So I calculate your room as being 238 sq feet, but I have no idea as to how much of the floor space is occupied by cabinets. That needs to be subtracted. I bought ours from warmly*yours.com and they offered a 20% discount for contractors. Figure out from your floor plan how much walking space you have - you can include or exclude the space under the toekick depending on whether your feet ever go there, and enter the area on the estimate tool on the their website. I don't think an estimate of $1000-$1200 would be too far off. Add to that price the cost of the thermostat as well, and the labor for your guy to do the work.

It was definitely worth it for us in our bathrooms - one bathroom had two "cold walls" or outside walls, so I wanted maximum warmth.

This website has an online estimation guide and a lot of helpful information.

http://www.nuheat.com/home.html

I put underfloor heat in my basement bathroom when we finished the basement and LOVED it - so for the kitchen reno, we put it in the kitchen (14X22)- it was a must. We put large format travertine on the floor and would have been miserable without the heat. We are in Maryland, in between DC and Balt, so it does get chilly here.

SunTouch will (at no charge) let you fax or email your kitchen plan, they will design the mat arrangement and send it back to you with an inventory list. You can then shop that design at your tile stores and at least see what kind of materials cost you're looking at.

HTH!

Like a previous poster, I got my electric radiant heat mats from Warmly Yours. We just turned them back on after being off all summer, and I just love them.

Warmly Yours is a good company to work with. If you give them a detailed kitchen plan they will work up a mat arrangement and provde you with a cost quote. They also provide enough information about the installation process that I felt confortable doing the install myself.

My kitchen is about 24' by 9.5' and the quote for the mat and the programmable thermostat came to a total of $1368.
Below is the drawing they produced of the mat layout:

Mats run $10/sq ft and up for materials. We found a $4/sq ft option which is wire only (not embedded in mats) from Warming Systems. We taped it to the floor with aluminum tape and then tiled over it. The thermostat added another $200 or so.

We put heated floor in both our master bath (over garage) and kitchen (over crawl space) and it makes a huge difference. Even the tile in our other 2 baths, which are over living space is chilly, so it would help there as well.

And you only put it on the walkable space, not inside pantries or under cabinets, so take that into account when calculating the cost.

We have been pricing around for our kitchen as well. We live in NY & winters do get cold. We currently have old hot water raditors & was planning to switch to radiant. I don't know the exact amount since we are doing over the whole kitchen & require alot of construction, i have been told if we don't put in radiant & use toe kick heaters w/ baseboard we would save about $2500. I don't know if prices are diffent in your area. I also have a basement underneathe 1/2 the kitchen and a crawl space under the rest.
Also, i was told to have the radiant go under the cabinets for more even heating. Anyone elso do this.

We have sort of the same situation where we have an unfinished basement under our master bath floor. Would it help to put a space heater in that area on a timer so it's on for 15 minutes before we wake up? Would that heat the floor above enough? We don't want to rip up the new tile since it's a new house built in 2013. Any other ideas?