Ask five contractors what a kitchen remodel costs and you’ll get five ranges so wide they tell you nothing. “Somewhere between $30,000 and $200,000” is not an answer. It’s a way of avoiding one.
So here is a straighter version, built from what we actually bid and build as a general contractor in Concord, CA and across the East Bay. Numbers are 2026 dollars, for a typical 150–250 square foot kitchen in Contra Costa County.
The three scope tiers
Almost every kitchen renovation in the East Bay falls into one of three tiers. The tier is set by how much of the room you’re actually moving.
Cosmetic refresh — $15,000 to $30,000
Nothing structural, nothing plumbed, nothing rewired. You keep the existing layout and the existing cabinet boxes. What changes is what you touch and see: new cabinet doors and drawer fronts or a professional refinish, new countertops, a new sink and faucet, a tile backsplash, new hardware, paint, and usually new light fixtures in the existing locations.
This tier makes sense when the kitchen works but looks tired, and when the cabinet boxes are still square, solid, and in the right places. It is by far the best return per dollar. It is also the tier most likely to disappoint if the underlying layout was the real problem — new doors on a bad floor plan is still a bad floor plan.
Mid-range remodel — $40,000 to $80,000
The most common kitchen remodeling project we run in Concord and Walnut Creek. Everything comes out. New semi-custom cabinetry, new countertops in quartz or granite, new appliances, new flooring, new lighting including recessed cans and under-cabinet runs, new backsplash, and modest electrical and plumbing updates — moving a sink a few feet, adding the dedicated circuits current code requires.
The layout stays broadly the same. Walls stay put. That single constraint is what holds this tier under $80,000.
Full gut and reconfiguration — $80,000 to $150,000+
Walls move. This is where a kitchen renovation becomes a construction project: removing a wall between the kitchen and the living room, relocating plumbing to a new island, upsizing the electrical panel, rerouting HVAC ducting, adding or enlarging windows, replacing subfloor.
Custom cabinetry, natural stone slabs, professional-grade appliances, and structural work push the top of this range well past $150,000. If the wall you want gone is load-bearing, add an engineer, a beam, and a permit revision to the schedule.
What actually drives the number
Four decisions move the price more than everything else combined.
Layout changes. Moving the sink, the range, or a wall is the single most expensive choice available to you. Plumbing and gas lines that stay put cost nothing to keep. Moving them means opening floors or walls, new venting, new supply, and a second round of inspections.
Cabinetry. Stock cabinets run roughly $150–$300 per linear foot installed. Semi-custom lands around $350–$650. Full custom starts near $800 and goes up without a ceiling. In a 20-linear-foot kitchen, that decision alone is a $13,000 swing before you’ve chosen a single finish.
Countertop material. Laminate to quartz to a book-matched natural stone slab spans roughly $2,500 to $18,000 in the same kitchen. Slab selection is also where fabrication complexity hides — waterfall edges, mitered corners, and integrated drainboards all carry real labor.
Appliances. A functional package runs $5,000–$8,000. A professional range, panel-ready refrigerator, and integrated hood is $20,000–$40,000. Appliances are also the most common source of schedule risk: a range that slips six weeks holds up countertop templating, which holds up backsplash, which holds up final.
The line items that get left off first estimates
This is the part homeowners get burned on. These costs are real, they’re knowable in advance, and a thin first estimate simply omits them so the bottom-line number looks competitive.
- Permit fees. For a kitchen involving electrical and plumbing, expect roughly $1,200–$3,500 in Contra Costa County jurisdictions, plus plan check time. If a wall is coming out, add structural plan review.
- Demolition and disposal. Multiple debris boxes at $600–$900 each, plus labor. A gut kitchen generates more waste than people expect, and cabinets do not compact.
- Temporary kitchen setup. Relocating the refrigerator, setting up a prep station, and running a temporary circuit. Small money, but it’s real and it belongs on the page.
- Electrical brought to current code. Once you open the walls, GFCI and AFCI protection, dedicated small-appliance circuits, and possibly a panel upgrade become required — not optional.
- Subfloor repair. Nobody knows what’s under the old flooring until it’s up. A good proposal carries an allowance for this rather than pretending the question doesn’t exist.
- Drywall, paint, and trim after the fact. The finish work that puts the room back together after every trade has been through it.
- Final cleaning and punch list. Not free, and worth paying for.
How to read a contractor’s proposal
When you have two or three proposals side by side, don’t start with the total. Start with these:
Is it line-itemed? A transparent, line-item estimate shows each element of scope priced on its own line. A single lump sum with the word “kitchen” next to it is not a proposal — it is a number you cannot audit, negotiate, or compare against anyone else’s.
Are allowances stated in dollars? Tile, fixtures, and appliances are often carried as allowances. A proposal that says “tile allowance: $18/sq ft installed” is honest. One that says “tile allowance: TBD” is deferring the argument to a moment when you have no leverage.
Is there a written schedule? Start date, rough-in inspection, cabinet delivery, countertop template, final. If a contractor won’t put milestones in writing before the deposit, that is information.
What is the change-order process? Ask directly: what happens when you open a wall and find something unexpected? The right answer is a documented change order with photos, an explanation, and a revised number, delivered before any additional work happens. That is how you get zero surprise change-orders — not by pretending surprises never occur, but by agreeing in advance how they’ll be handled.
Is the license active? Every California contractor’s license can be verified in about thirty seconds on the CSLB website. Ours is #812248. Check it. Check everyone’s.
Where to start
If you’re planning a kitchen renovation in the East Bay, the most useful next step isn’t a Pinterest board — it’s a walkthrough with someone who will tell you what the layout you want will actually cost to build, before you fall in love with it.
We do those for free across Concord, Walnut Creek, Pleasant Hill, and Martinez. You’ll get a written, itemized proposal in about 48 hours, and it will include the lines other estimates leave off.