Cost of Mrs. Jones' New Kitchen...

[billysmommy]

O.M.G!!!!

Now how is she going to tell Mr Jones she doesn't want to go back to work?

I love reading about the Joneses ~ maybe this will bring a reality check ~ yikes :)

[JoyNChrist]

That's more than half of what I paid for my house.

The whole thing.

Living room, dining room, kitchen, 2 bedrooms, bathroom, utility room.

Wow.

[Wife_and_mommy]

Is that the estimate? If so, it'll probably be 30-35 in actual practice. Mama mia...

I feel sorry for her really. She's buying a pit in her stomach for a really long time. So not worth it.



I love them most when they are sleeping.--Me
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[MelissaTC]

>That's more than half of what I paid for my house.
>
>The whole thing.
>
>Living room, dining room, kitchen, 2 bedrooms, bathroom,
>utility room.
>
>Wow.


Holy cow. Where do you live????

[egfmba]

Awesome-tastic! That's fabulous. I can't wait to hear how well the marriage survives the makeover, much less the resulting bills.

I truly hope she becomes a SAHM. Then she can bankrupt her family and we can all hear about *those* hijinks!

Whoops. Too far. Going straight to a corner office in H*ll. Ah, well, at least it'll have a view....}(

eva

[kijip]

Am I the only ones that sees all these people with designer pricey kitchens that don't cook or use them? Like, they are heating up mac and cheese in grand stainless steel style? That is the hunch I have here.

At even 7% (and they are likely paying more) they are going to be paying for that kitchen for YEARS to come.

[mudder17]

LOL, well, our neighbors went over budget for their house for more than we paid for our house. MUCH more!

Eileen

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[LarsMal]

Yeah, seriously, that's what I was going to ask!!! Is that for your "real" house, or what you're in right now w/DH in NOLA?

[LarsMal]

On CREDIT! Lovely! What freakin' morons!

[missym]

Me too. Granted it was 10 years ago, but still. (I'm in Indiana, the Land-of-Housing-Affordability, btw). I thought our kitchen remodel was expensive at $2000.

Missy, mom to Gwen 03/03 and Rebecca 09/05

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[gatorsmom]

I know about the Joneses than I do my own next-door neighbors. Scary.

Ok, let's see. They no longer have a tenant upstairs to help pay the cost of living in their neighborhood. If I remember correctly, that was about $1000 per month. That was because she didn't agree to the exhorbitant monthly increase in rent of about $200. And since kicking her out they now have to renovate her apartment. More money out. So, now they have the increase in taxes, no rent coming in for a few months and apartment renovation costs.

Well OF COURSE, they had to use credit to renovate their kitchen. They have no cash!!! And since Mrs. Jones no longer wants to work, credit was the only option. Makes perfect sense to me.

Now, anyone want to place bets on how long before Mrs. Jones starts complaining that Mr. Jones doesn't make enough money? (or, probably she's already doing that). Anyone want to bet on how long their marraige will last with all these financial blunders weighing them down?

(btw, thank you Elizabeth, for making my marriage and life seem like a beautiful dream :)).

Lisa
Mom to Gator July 2003
And Cha-Cha July 2005
and surprise! twins due 11/07!

[JoyNChrist]

My real house!

I live in a little bitty town in southwest Louisiana...property's pretty cheap, and it's a small house (about 1500 square feet on 1/2 acre with a fenced backyard).

We paid 45K about a year ago. The house is about 50 years old, but it was in great condition when we bought it...really only needed to be painted. We also added crown molding and expanded the front porch. But no more than $2,000 worth of materials went into it (we did all the work ourselves). We plan to build a bigger house in a few years (my father, my FIL, and my grandfather are all contractors), and we'll keep this as a rent house, since it'll be paid for.

I'm not crazy about our town, but there are some definite benefits! :-)

[Marisa6826]

Wow and you're sure that's in US Dollars and not in Russian Rubles stolen from her poor destitute little old Russian tenant?

Man, karma is going to turn around and bite her in the ass one day. HARD.

-m

[elizabethkott]

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Twenty. Five. THOUSAND. Dollars.

On credit.

Awesome.

Discuss.

[katydid1971]

I'm not surprised at all, once you get granite counter tops, a viking range, sub zero frige, maple cupboards, fisher and pikal drawer disher washer, etc it can easily add up. Yet somehow I am able to put out pretty good dinners on my tile counters and kenmore appliances. I agree with the pp that Mrs. Jones idea of cooking is probably Mac and Cheese. It does seem the people who do the least cooking have the best kitchens. You should drop a Suze Orman book on her front step ring the door beall and run away. Of course Suze would disagree with everything she has done so far so I bet Mrs. Jones wouldn't appreciate it. I feel sorry for that little baby growing up with a mother who's values are so off balance. I hope this doesn't cause the Jones to divorce but like pp said it probably will.
Sarah

[elliput]

Ouch. I sure hope the value of the house is worth putting a $25K kitchen in.

[bubbaray]

Are you kidding me?!? Wow, I'm movin'. :)


Melissa

DD#1: 04/2004

DD#2: 01/2007

[LarsMal]

Me too! I better not show DH this thread or he'll have us moved and retired in no time! Well, maybe that wouldn't be so bad :-)

Oh...and 1500 sq feet isn't that small!! The townhouse we sold last year in the MD 'burbs of DC wasn't a whole lot bigger and sold for over 500K. I'm sure in Cali it would be a pretty penny, too, especially on that much land!

Small towns are sounding much better every day!

ETA: I read it wrong- I thought you were on 2 acres, but still 1/2 acre isn't too shabby!

[ett]

Okay, now I'm depressed! Our house in MA is about 1500 square feet (and about 50 years old) and we paid ten times more than you did for it 5 years ago. We need to move!!

[C99]

>Me too. Granted it was 10 years ago, but still. (I'm in
>Indiana, the Land-of-Housing-Affordability, btw). I thought
>our kitchen remodel was expensive at $2000.

And a state that actually makes money every year (says the FIB...my MIL is from Indiana and told me this about the Indiana budget).

[JoyNChrist]

My aunt's a real estate agent in my town...who wants to be my neighbor? ;-)

[elephantmeg]

Oh my. Too funny and I guarantee they won't be cooking in it! When we were building our house I got one of those fancy kitchen books for ideas (the ones whose kitchens run $50,000 I'm sure) and I can't believe I would ever dare to do anything in them! I might break the imported stone floors or something! My big splurge? A flat top stove (the basic model by whirlpool) and I love, love, love it!

[egoldber]

"I'm not surprised at all, once you get granite counter tops, a viking range, sub zero frige, maple cupboards, fisher and pikal drawer disher washer, etc it can easily add up"

Those things would add up to WAY more than 20-25K. Maple cabinets alone would be more than that.

Honestly, that really isn't a lot of money for a total kitchen remodel. Now doing it on credit when you can't afford it is a really poor choice. Doing it with a home equity loan (if they have any equity) is a better plan.

But updating your kitchen adds a lot of resale value to your home although in the current market, again maybe not a wise choice. But if its a home you plan to stay in for a long time and can afford it, depending on the value of your homw, its not an unwise thing to do. In a 50K home, a 25K kitchen is stupid. In a 500K home, its not.

[megs4413]

we used to have friends just like this...they stopped calling us eventually...

we ran into them in my DH's parents' neighborhood...apparently they bought this old farmhouse that's on the land and are completely redoing it. problem was, they sold their house really quickly and this new house won't be move in ready for MONTHS. so they had to BUY ANOTHER HOUSE! so they own two houses now, plus the 3 ridiculously expensive cars they already had and all the other stuff they can't afford...and now they're redoing this new house completely...so far they've put a wrap around porch on it, all new windows/doors, put in a circle drive and a new retaining wall, and a beautiful privacy fence...

the guy makes less than my DH!!! I can't imagine how they're affording all of this....i worry for their son's future....

[1ceng1]

After pricing everything for a kitchen remodel(we're in the NE), believe it or not, $25K is not that bad a deal. Cabinets are the big expense, not to mention labor costs which is a HUGE expense. A lot of people would be very pleased to be able to to a full kitchen remodel for $25K. Figure labor was probably half the cost, cabinets, granite, new appliances, flooring, backsplash, lighting, hardware, and there you have $25K.
BIL is a contractor, $75K and up are the usual numbers so he tells me. Kudos for the neighbor for getting a decent deal (IF that includes labor).

[maestramommy]

Only 1500 square feet? tee hee! Stacey, a house on our street that size was going for almost $700k last month, and it sold! That's a BIG house! tee hee!

[HIU8]

Man, I would be jumping for joy if our kitchen remodel only cost $25,000 retail. We had to replace everything except the dishwasher because our kitchen floor was falling into the basement--undisclosed termite damage that was never taken care of. Even with middle of the road appliances, flooring and cabinets it can add up. Labor is the really big part though. We even had a contractor friend do all the work after we did the demolition. If we had not done that we would have a kitchen that costs closer to $40,000.

Now doing it on credit--that's just silly. A home equity line of credit is what we did and we know we will get our money's worth out of the house if/when we decide to move because we fixed a lot that was wrong and updated things to be from this century.

Heather
DS 11/27/04
DD 6/9/07

[Melanie]

>Am I the only ones that sees all these people with designer
>pricey kitchens that don't cook or use them? Like, they are
>heating up mac and cheese in grand stainless steel style?
>That is the hunch I have here.
>

Hey now, I resemble that remark! Except it's Trader Joe's Pasta and jar of sauce. ;)

[khalloc]

Is this supposed to be jaw-dropping because of other things going on in your neighbor's lives (sorry i only drop into this board every few months). Because its not hard to spend $25K redoing your kitchen. My husband and I did it on our last house and it was a good move. We didnt put all of it on credit, but we did do some like the appliances (maybe $3K). Kitchens get expensive. And we did all of the labor ourselves. I'm just not seeing how $25K on a kitchen is so shocking?!

[Marisa6826]

For most 'normal' families, $25k isn't.

However, there is much more to this story. If you do a search for the Jones Family, you will find the significance of the kitchen renovation. Let it suffice to say that this particular woman is in no position to be dropping this kind of cash at this time in her life on something she most definitely doesn't need, given her chosen lifestyle.

(Sorry Liz, if you want to clarify, I will edit this out)

-m

[elizabethkott]

Oh no, you hit it right on the head. It's the combination of several factors that make the $25K such a noteworthy figure.
Partly because they bought a house they couldn't afford well above the asking price in a down market just to seemingly "follow" us, yet again...
partly because they recently (stupidly) got rid of their tenant, whom they need in order to afford the *&^%ing taxes in this town...
partly because Mrs. Jones is being a pretty pretty princess and deciding that not only does she not want to go back to work to help pay the mortgage on said expensive, beyond their means house, but that she wants to continue taking classes full time towards the end of a further certificate (NOT a degree, a "certificate") which means more money out and no money *in*...
PLUS, ****as previously not posted here**** she now wants a PART TIME NANNY to work three days a week and one night so she CAN take the classes which is MORE money out...
So then, $25K is a lot to spend on a full remodel of a kitchen that could have functioned just fine with new appliances for $3K.
On credit.
That, in essence, is the wonderment of the Joneses.
:)