Redo kitchen in house we just bought?

[Chalatte]

Hi,
So we bought an old(ca.1900s) house in London and thought it was OK in our viewing.
After moving in we realised the kitchen hadn't been touched in decades and is really tired. Like once the old owners moved away taking their appliances with, we noticed that all the floors on one side beneath the fridge etc have no flooring 😅
We've been inclined to get one side of the kitchen done up entirely - - floor, kitchen counter, and units. The other side is OK.

I've got 3 kids and we both work full time. I'm just trying to figure out how long this sort of project would take x what it could cost me and how insane is it to undertake this? Any advice, experiences, suggestions of how you've renovated part of your kitchen while living at home would be appreciated !

Thanks!

I think it would be rather odd to do just one side of the kitchen. I would live with it for a few months at least, finesse your new kitchen plan and do it all in one go when you can afford it and can deal with the disruption (and you really don't want the disruption twice). You may well want to move appliances etc. and may need new electrics to meet building regs etc.

So the wet counter is the one I want to redo. The kitchen counter is made of wood and is literally rotten/black with water damage! There's other issues like the absentee floor and just really dirty/unusable shelving which makes it impossible to use.
The dry counter is actually quite OK.

The other caveat is the house has extension potential and if I wanted to extend I would certainly redo the dry counter (with the hob/oven) because it's against a wall that will need breaking for extending.

My idea of doing up the one side was just to fix the issues in it now, and make it basically workable, and when we get round to extending it in say a year or two we could keep it.

I hope that makes sense

Personally I wouldn't have had these plans before but now that I've seen/worked in the kitchen I don't think I can avoid it. I've been cramming things into other counters etc because of the lack of shelving and a workable countertop. What would you do in my place?

I think it would be strange to just do half of your kitchen.

Putting a new kitchen in isn't a big renovation and ut is completely normal not to move out whilst having it done.

Cost is really dependent on size and spec.

Thanks, but I'm loath to do the other half because it's actually fine-and will get ripped up for the extension for sure and I don't want to put money on it just yet!

you could redo the 'wet side' with (for example) standard IKEA cupboards with the aim of buying the same IKEA cupboards for the 'dry side' when you redo that in a few years time?

Surely your own appliances will cover no flooring - my newbuild doesn’t have flooring under the appliances so ime that’s normal.

kitchens are really expensive so can you just change the worktop to a laminate to tide you over until you do the extension? I’ve lived with a falling apart kitchen for 5 years while we did the rest of the house. New kitchen is costing £22k. That’s quartz worktops, appliances (except washing machine and dryer) and wood painted cupboards and includes fitting and electrical works etc.

i’d try to salvage what you have if at all possible. Get an electric sander and sand the wooden work top back and see if you can sand out the black and then refining with a hardwax oil like Osmo . If you cant salvage it change for laminate.

Your appliances will cover floor. For dirty shelving clean as much as possible with Barkeepers friend and magic erasers. If that doesn’t work hen paint it. Clean with something to take the grease off then a couple of coats of zinsser Bullseye to prime and then coat with whatever colour you want, I’d go to a decorators merchant and ask what paint they recommend and you can get them to colour match the paint as well if you want to.

Having had a quick look online if the staining doesn’t come off after sanding look up oxalic acid.

We had our kitchen & bathroom nenovated and we lived there during it. I think it was about 2 weeks. We used a kitchen place that did everything. During the time the appliances were not installed we put the microwave, kettle, coffee maker and toaster, on the dining room table to use as a makeshift kitchen.

PS. We did a temporary facelift ourselves 6 years earlier, we replaced the stained worktops and put a tiled backsplash up.

I'd be tempted just to change the worktop. I wouldn't worry about not having flooring under appliances.

Because if you do one side you can guarantee that you'd not be able to get the same colour units when you redo the other side.

What's a wet and a dry counter?

I would just change the worktop and leave the rest. Won't your own appliances cover the floor?

Wet counter is presumably the one with the sink, dry counter one without plumbing.

For economy and sustainability, I’d just salvage what’s usable, making minor repairs and replacements, rather than a redo of the wet side. When you come to extend, you might want to change the kitchen layout entirely or lay new flooring throughout, your tastes might have changed, etc. Live with it with repairs for now.

Another "what are wet and dry counters" question please.
I have never heard those terms before.

If you're planning an extension, I'd just live with the kitchen and do it all at once when you extend.

The kitchen is usable, it's not mandatory that it should also be easy on the eye.

It can be normal to not have flooring under the cabinets/appliances, it’s a perfectly legitimate way of fitting a kitchen. It honestly sounds like it could just be the worktop that’s the issue (a common problem with putting wood around wet areas). I would sand that, and then treat with oxalic acid before sealing with boat varnish or similar. I’d try very hard to live with the current kitchen until I had decided what to do longer term re: extension.

Thanks for the advice all, really gives me something to think about.

Yeah the worktop is the biggest issue. With all the appliances in the floor isn't as noticeable
But I figured I may as well raise the level a bit and get cabinets redone, getting more storage and getting newer cabinets. I'm no good at diy so I will have to trust the professionals

But I will look into cost as a consideration and see what I can get done without breaking the bank!

I prefer flooring under appliances too, just to avoid mouse-friendly gaps: not sure how old your kids are but I would hold off with too much upheaval until you do the extension, new work-top, deep clean would be a good stop-gap.

We previously bought a house with a filthy, falling apart kitchen and just did what we needed to do to make it useable - integrated oven was condemned so that was sawn out and we replaced with a freestanding one which we then put into our new kitchen several years later. And a very thorough clean!

You could just replace the worktop? It's common for the floor to be covered right the way back under appliances - this was the case with our new kitchen.