Kitchen Renovation Costs in Spain: €8k to €14k

Kitchen Renovation Costs in Spain: €8k to €14k

Renovating a kitchen in Spain costs between €8,000 and €14,000 if hired as a turnkey project. The alternative circulating among those who have been through the ordeal is buying materials piece by piece and installing them yourself. The savings are not cosmetic. One participant claims to have seen a complete kit with fridge, hob, cabinets, and hood for €1,200, while an IKEA kitchen with appliances jumps to €4,500 plus €600 for installation. The difference between these figures is not just quality: it is who does the work and how many intermediaries charge along the way.

The first budget mentioned in the conversation is from a store: €8,000. Another case, a square kitchen measuring 2.3 by 2.5 meters, accumulates budgets exceeding €14,000. And that is not where the problem ends: within those numbers are items that can be dismantled. In one IKEA quote, €1,600 were for appliances and a dishwasher nobody had asked for appeared. The shower-style faucet offered there could be found for half the price at a large DIY retailer.

Where to buy materials without getting ripped off

The first repeated rule is separating materials from labor. DIY chains like Brico Depot, Bricomart, or Castorama appear as the starting point for tiles, flooring, and kitchen cabinets. Furniture comes in kits and assembly is affordable for someone with patience. Appliances are better bought online or in stock, outlet, and clearance stores, where new items have been seen at nearly half price.

For countertops, there is an intermediate solution that avoids paying for cutting and fitting: order pressboard cut to size, mark the sink and hob openings, drill the corners, and finish with a jigsaw. The result is not granite, but neither is the cost. For tiles, the cheapest option is to look for remnants: you only need the square meters of the area between the counter and upper cabinets, not the entire wall.

Can you paint tiles or do they need removing?

You can paint them, and it is the most economical route when the tile is sound. There is enamel paint for bathtubs that leaves an acceptable finish, and also specific vinyls to cover tiles. The problem arises when there are drill holes, broken pieces, or areas yellowed by years of a damaged hood: painting does not disguise, it merely masks. The intermediate alternative is to tile only the work front and leave the rest plastered and painted with satin paint, which cleans easily.

Regarding sticking new tiles over old ones, one participant's warning is blunt: tiles are a finish, they do not support the weight of others on top, and they eventually come loose. If you want to change them properly, you must chip away the old adhesive, fill the gaps, and take the opportunity to create new chases for wiring. Debris goes in bags to the recycling center, emptying the bag rather than throwing it whole.

Flooring: vinyl, ceramic, or leave it as is

Vinyl flooring in tiles or self-adhesive rolls is the most repeated option. It is installed over existing floors, but has a defect: any depression in the grout lines of old tiles will show over time. If aesthetics matter, leveling with fine cement is required beforehand. For dog owners, ceramic remains the recommendation. Some directly propose sanding and treating the current floor to remove dirt, without undertaking construction work.

Electrical installation: where savings kill

Here consensus breaks down. Changing cables is simple if conduits exist: tie the new wire to the old and pull. If not, furniture covering the entire wall allows using surface trunking or conduit with exposed mechanisms, a solution that also has an industrial touch. But touching electricity without experience is not the same as painting. Calculating cable sections, knowing which wire goes to the oven and which to outlets, cannot be improvised. Water and gas directly require professionals.

The lesson: cheap handyman services cost dearly

The story's conclusion is the most useful. The person who started the process hired a "recommended handyman" to paint tiles and assemble furniture. The result: slowness, charging by time, and quality that did not compensate for the savings. Their conclusion is twofold: either do it yourself from start to finish, or pay a professional with guarantees. The middle ground, the low-cost handyman, is the worst of both worlds.

Some argue that buying cheap has only two paths: used goods or sourcing each item where it is cheapest, assembling it yourself. Everything else is paying someone to earn more than your neighbor. The problem is that the trade has accumulated a fruta for shoddy work, pushing many to try alone. The prediction, with reservations: as long as budgets remain in five figures for five-meter kitchens, forced DIY will continue to grow, even if the results do not always match.