Our shop sits in 77077. Kitchen remodel contractor here in Houston is about as local as our work gets.

A kitchen remodel is not one project, it is six trades sharing a room in a specific order, and most of the pain people experience comes from that order being wrong. Countertops cannot be measured until cabinets are set and level. Cabinets cannot go in until the floor and paint are done. Electrical rough cannot be finished until the layout is truly final, because moving an outlet after drywall means opening drywall.

What follows is the actual sequence, including the waiting periods that are not negotiable and the decisions that have to be locked well before they feel urgent. Knowing the order is most of what makes a remodel feel controlled rather than chaotic.

Scope of work

Design and selections come first and take longer than people plan for. The cabinet layout, appliance models with their real dimensions, sink and faucet, and the countertop material all need to be settled before demo, because each one dictates rough plumbing, electrical and framing.

Then protection and demo. Floor and pathway protection, dust containment at openings, and a plan for temporary kitchen function. Demo removes cabinets, counters, flooring and finishes, and it is the point where the house tells you what it has been hiding.

Rough-in follows: any framing changes, plumbing moved to serve the new sink and dishwasher locations, electrical circuits for appliances, outlets, under-cabinet lighting and ceiling fixtures, and mechanical work for a hood or a relocated vent. Where the scope crosses into permitted work, inspections happen at this stage, before anything gets covered.

Then insulation where opened, drywall, texture and paint, followed by flooring if it runs under the cabinets. Cabinets are installed next, and they get shimmed and scribed until they are genuinely level and plumb, because everything after them inherits that reference.

Countertop templating happens after cabinets are set, on site, with the sink and cooktop present. Fabrication takes time, and that window is a normal part of the schedule rather than a delay. Counters install, then backsplash tile, then plumbing and electrical trim — faucet, disposal, dishwasher connection, switches, fixtures — then appliance set, hardware, touch-up, and a walk-through punch list.

Common mistakes

The scheduling error that hurts most is demolishing before cabinets are built, delivered and inspected for damage. If a door arrives cracked or a run is short, the household lives in an open kitchen while a replacement is ordered. Cabinets land first, then demo.

The second is treating countertop template as a same-week item. Template cannot happen until cabinets are set, shimmed and secured, and fabrication takes real time after that. Anyone promising to remove the old counter and install the new one continuously is either reusing the old template or planning to leave you without a sink longer than they admitted.

Third, not confirming that fixture stops hold before scheduling. A stop that weeps when closed turns a two-hour kitchen isolation into a whole-house shutdown at an inconvenient hour. Fourth, leaving HVAC returns unsealed and then blaming the dust on demolition. Fifth, no dedicated route and staging for debris in a tight Energy Corridor driveway, which turns into vehicles blocked in and neighbours calling. All of these are planning items, not luck.

Where the budget goes

Scope is the first and largest driver, and the dividing line is whether anything moves. Replacing cabinets and counters in the existing footprint is one category. Changing the layout — relocating the sink, adding an island with plumbing, moving the range — is another, because it means slab work, and on post-tension slabs it means scanning first.

Structural changes are their own tier. Removing a wall between a kitchen and living room is common here and requires determining whether it is load bearing and, if so, engineering and a beam.

Cabinetry spans the widest range of any single line item, from stock to semi-custom to full custom, and the box construction matters as much as the door. Countertop material, edge detail and any waterfall or mitred work add. Appliance selection can rival cabinetry, and pro-style ranges bring hood and gas requirements with them.

Condition surprises are real and worth budgeting a contingency for: cast iron drains, failing supply lines, unlevel floors from slab movement, and wiring that needs updating. Permitted plumbing, electrical and structural work adds, and requirements differ between the City of Houston, unincorporated Harris County and Fort Bend.

What gets specified

Cabinetry is where the two paths diverge most. In an older house with an out-of-level slab and plaster-era walls, frameless boxes with generous scribe allowance and adjustable legs are easier to make land straight than a face-frame run installed tight to the wall. In either house the box should be plywood, not particleboard: under a Houston sink, a minor supply weep turns a particleboard deck to mush, while plywood dries. Drawer boxes dovetailed, slides full-extension undermount.

Door and finish selection is a humidity decision. Painted MDF five-piece doors stay flat through seasonal swings where solid stile-and-rail paint tends to open a hairline at the joints. Finishes should be sprayed catalyzed or two-part coatings, not brushed wall paint. Thermofoil near a dishwasher vent or wall oven delaminates and is worth avoiding.

Countertops: quartz needs no sealing and shrugs off hard water, but discolours near a sunny west window and does not like a hot pan straight off a burner. Granite and quartzite take heat but want periodic sealing and show mineral rings if hard water is left standing.

What Houston conditions demand

Two Houston realities shape kitchen scopes more than anything else. The first is that these houses sit on slab-on-grade over expansive clay. Every drain line for a sink is cast into or run beneath that slab. So moving a sink across the room, or adding a sink to a new island, is not a plumbing task — it is concrete cutting, trenching, re-plumbing, and repouring. On a post-tension slab, which is standard in newer Katy, Cypress and Fulshear construction, tendons have to be located by scanning before any cutting, because severing one is a serious and expensive event. That single fact decides more Houston kitchen layouts than any design principle.

The second is the age split in the housing stock. In 1960s to 1980s inner-Houston homes, demo commonly exposes cast iron drain lines that have been corroding from the inside for decades, older supply piping, and ceilings that predate 1980 where popcorn texture should be tested by a qualified party before disturbance. Homes wired in the late sixties and early seventies may have aluminum branch circuits, which matters once you start adding appliance loads.

Humidity shapes specification: plywood cabinet boxes over particleboard, an exhaust system that genuinely vents outside, and finishes that tolerate a room that is rarely dry. In parts of the metro with flood history, some homeowners choose tile flooring and raised outlets deliberately.

What we see in Houston

Houston is not one housing stock, so it is not one kind of remodel. In the Heights and Woodland Heights you are often working on 1910s–1930s wood-frame homes on pier-and-beam, where leveling, sill and joist repair, and original wiring long past its service life come before anything cosmetic — and where a home in a designated historic district brings design review with it. Montrose, Oak Forest and Garden Oaks add mid-century layers. Meyerland, Westbury, Braeswood and Sharpstown are largely 1950s–60s slab ranch: cast iron drains near the end of their life, galvanized supply, single-pane windows, popcorn ceilings that should be tested before they are disturbed. Memorial and Alief lean 1970s–80s, which brings aluminum branch wiring and polybutylene supply into the conversation. West of Beltway 8 you are usually in 2000s and 2010s construction, where the job is upgrade rather than repair. Houston has no zoning, but plumbing, electrical and structural work is permitted, and deed restrictions still govern a great deal.

The process

We start with the room and how you use it, then work out what your house will physically allow — particularly whether the layout you want requires cutting the slab, because that changes the conversation early rather than late.

Selections get locked before demo. Cabinets, appliances with model numbers, sink, faucet and countertop material all feed the rough-in, and a decision deferred is a decision that will cost more later. Long-lead items are ordered ahead.

During the work you get a sequence you can follow: demo, rough-in and any inspections, drywall and paint, flooring, cabinets, template, fabrication, counters, backsplash, trim-out, appliances, punch. The gaps — particularly countertop fabrication — are explained as part of the plan rather than presented as a hold-up.

Site protection and daily cleanup are part of the job, since you are living there.

We are on Lock Ln in the Energy Corridor and work throughout the Houston metro. To start a conversation about your kitchen, call (281) 235-6971.

Common questions

How long will I be without a kitchen?

<p>It varies with scope, and anyone quoting a firm number before seeing your house is guessing. What we can tell you is the shape of it: demo and rough-in, then a period of finish work, then a wait for countertop fabrication between cabinet install and counter install, then trim-out. That fabrication window is fixed by the fabricator's schedule. We plan a temporary kitchen setup for the duration.</p>

Do I need a permit for a kitchen remodel?

<p>It depends on what you are doing and where you are. Inside Houston city limits there is no zoning, but plumbing, electrical and structural work is permitted. Unincorporated Harris County and Fort Bend have their own requirements. Cosmetic replacement in the existing footprint is treated differently from relocating plumbing or removing a wall. We confirm requirements for your specific address rather than assuming.</p>

Why can countertops not be measured before the cabinets go in?

<p>Because the template has to reflect the cabinets as actually installed, including how they were shimmed to deal with an out-of-level floor. Stone is cut to a template with very little tolerance, and a measurement taken from drawings will not match reality. Templating on set cabinets, with the sink and cooktop present so cutouts are exact, is what produces counters that fit without visible gaps.</p>

Can I move my sink to the island?

<p>Often yes, but understand what it involves in a slab-on-grade house. The drain must be run beneath or through the slab, which means cutting concrete, trenching, plumbing, and repouring. If your slab is post-tension, tendons must be located by scanning before any cut, because cutting one is a serious matter. It is a legitimate thing to do; it is simply a bigger scope item than it appears on a floor plan.</p>

Do you cover Houston 77077?

Yes — Houston 77077 is our own area. Our shop is at 1530 W Sam Houston Pkwy N, Houston, TX 77043. Call (281) 235-6971 to arrange a site visit.

MS Home Remodeling — kitchen remodel contractor in Houston, TX 77077. Call (281) 235-6971 for a site visit.