Countertop Adventures
Sunday, February 23, 2014
We are still progressing on the basement and it's been fun learning even more about renovating these last couple weeks.
On Presidents Day David and I worked a half day and then started looking for countertops for the kitchen and bathroom. From David's time in real estate investment, he's learned that putting granite in is a good investment; it looks great, it's durable, and it adds to the value of your home. Plus after looking at other synthetic types of countertops and realizing the pricing is comparable to granite, we decided to go with granite.
Home Depot and Lowes were pretty pricey, so after researching a little more we found out that the more cost effective way to do granite is through a fabricator. A fabricator sends you to a granite warehouse. Then you pick out the slab you want, reserve it, and then the fabricator has it sent to them where they will cut it and install it for you. The fabricator we're working with sent us to Contempo, a granite gallery in South Salt Lake.
Having never done anything like this before, it was fun to explore a huge warehouse and see all the different varieties.
I never realized that the granite itself isn't what costs the most usually- it's the labor. Unless of course you pick a really crazy slab like the one behind me, then it will run you a bazillion dollars.
This was David's favorite one, you could see the blue in the blacker parts from different angles- I think it might have been $100 a square foot! Crazy!
One way to lower the cost of your slab is to go with a "classic" piece of stone. This means the stone isn't all uniform. You can see in the picture of the slab above that there are darker veins at the bottom of the slab that aren't elsewhere.
Luckily we like the character the "classic" pieces have. Plus when you reserve a piece at a granite yard, it's the exact piece you will have in your home so you know exactly what to expect. In the piece above you can see more dramatic veins in the slab.
We're hoping to have our countertops in the next few weeks, I'll post pictures of kitchen when we've got it all in.
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