Should You Refinish Or Replace Your Kitchen Cabinets at Home?

Kitchen cabinets are one of the main focal points of your kitchen design. It’s fair to say that they are noticed by everyone that walks into this part of your home. As such, you need to ensure that they look fantastic and set the tone for the overall interior design.

For whatever reason, you may reach a point where you’re no longer happy with the state of your cabinets. Perhaps they are decades old and have started to show signs of wear and tear. Consequently, you’ve got a tough decision on your hands as you want to upgrade these cabinets to make them gorgeous once more.

Instinctively, you think about replacing them. Not a bad idea, but it can be rather expensive. Alternatively, you could look into refinishing your cabinets. Effectively, this means that you give them a new look without replacing the cabinets themselves. It’s a way of refreshing the old design or changing the color without a full-scale kitchen remodeling job. Both of these options will have pros and cons, so how do you know which one is the right thing to do for your kitchen?

Below, we’ve looked at the real advantages of each, helping to come to the correct conclusion.

The advantages of refinishing kitchen cabinets at Home

Firstly, if you refinish kitchen cabinets you will save a lot of time and money. A refinishing job doesn’t take much time to do as you are only dealing with the aesthetic nature of your cabinets. The surface is refinished and stained with a new look that’s more in keeping with the times. Nothing needs to be taken apart, so it’s far less disruptive. The lack of manual labor required is part of the reason this is cheaper than replacing kitchen cabinets.

By contrast, a replacement job can take a few days and will require someone to take down all of your existing cabinets, fitting new ones instead. It’s a more drawn-out process, and you also have to pay for all of the new cabinets – which can be costly depending on what you’re buying.

Secondly, refinishing kitchen cabinets is arguably better for the environment. In essence, you save wood by not going out and getting new cabinets made for your kitchen. You’re making the current ones last longer than expected, stopping any additional trees from being cut down. Just think about how many trees could be saved if everyone considered refinishing instead of replacing them.

The advantages of replacing kitchen cabinets at Home

Considering all the above, you might wonder why you’d ever bother replacing kitchen cabinets. Yes, it’s more expensive, takes more time, and uses up more wood. However, there are still some significant advantages that make it a better option in certain cases.

For one, replacing your kitchen cabinets will help you improve the functionality of your kitchen. One of the reasons your old ones are no longer doing it for you could be that they don’t have enough storage space. Replacing them with taller or wider cabinets can help you store more kitchen items, freeing up space in your kitchen and making the interior feel bigger.

Similarly, your biggest complaint might be that the layout of your cabinets isn’t practical enough for you. This happens when you move into a house and the old kitchen is designed in a way that wasn’t chosen by you. The cabinets could be too high up or in inconvenient places, making it hard for you to reach things every day. As a result, replacing these cabinets with new ones in a new layout lets you improve the practicality and functionality of your kitchen.

Furthermore, your old kitchen cabinets might be suffering from relatively severe wear and tear. Effectively, the hinges could be getting loose, there might even be some rot on the wood, and the structural integrity is questionable. Refinishing them will make them look nicer, but replacing them can help you get brand new cabinets that are structurally sound and will last even longer. So, if your cabinets have signs of things like mold, water damage, or other significant physical issues, replacing them may be the only option. Refinishing only covers things up, meaning the problems continue to exist.

Should you refinish or replace home cabinets?

In conclusion, which option is the right one for you?

Ultimately, it depends on your biggest complaints and the state of your kitchen cabinets. If they are structurally sound and you have no issues with the layout, refinishing is a smarter option to save money, time, and materials. You can upgrade the look of your cabinets in no time at all.

By contrast, if your kitchen cabinets are in a terrible state or just aren’t practical enough in their current layout, replacing them is the better option.