Appliances are almost never included in our cabinetry and construction pricing, and they’re also the line item homeowners underestimate most consistently. A full appliance package — range, hood, refrigerator, and dishwasher — deserves its own budget conversation early in the design process, not a decision made after everything else is finished.
Why appliances need to be decided before, not after, cabinetry
Appliance dimensions drive cabinet opening sizes, electrical and gas rough-in locations, and ventilation duct routing. A 36-inch range needs a 36-inch cabinet opening built to spec, and a range hood’s CFM rating determines what size duct needs to run through your ceiling or wall cavity — which has to be planned before drywall goes up, not after. We ask for at least preliminary appliance selections during design, even if final model numbers get locked in later.
Budgeting by tier
Builder-grade package (range, hood, fridge, dishwasher together): typically $4,000–$8,000 for a full four-piece package from a mainstream brand. This is a real, functional option and not something to be embarrassed about — plenty of excellent kitchens run mainstream appliances.
Mid-range package: typically $8,000–$16,000, often where homeowners start considering a gas or dual-fuel range, a counter-depth refrigerator (which reads as more built-in and costs a premium for the same interior capacity), and a quieter dishwasher.
Premium/professional-style package: $16,000–$35,000+, entering professional or luxury brand territory with commercial-style ranges, larger-capacity ventilation, and integrated panel-ready refrigeration and dishwashers that hide behind cabinetry fronts.
The range hood: the most underbudgeted piece
Homeowners consistently budget for the range and forget the hood needs to match it in both power and physical scale — an oversized professional-style range paired with an undersized or underpowered hood won’t actually ventilate the cooktop properly. As a rule of thumb, hood CFM should scale with cooktop BTU output, and a wider range needs a proportionally wider hood, not just a more powerful motor in a narrow housing. Custom hood inserts hidden inside a cabinetry surround add cost but let the ventilation match the range’s performance without a visually oversized hood dominating the room.
Panel-ready vs. standard-finish appliances
Panel-ready refrigerators and dishwashers accept a custom cabinetry front panel that matches your surrounding cabinets, creating a seamless built-in look with no visible appliance finish at all. They cost more than the standard-finish version of the same appliance, plus the cost of the matching panel itself, but they’re the detail that makes a kitchen photograph and feel genuinely custom rather than “nice with appliances dropped in.”
Gas, electric, or induction?
Gas remains the most common range fuel type we install in Hamilton County kitchens, largely because most of the homes we work in already have a gas line run to the kitchen. Induction has grown significantly in interest — it heats faster than gas or standard electric and is easier to keep clean — but it requires cookware that’s induction-compatible (magnetic-bottomed) and a dedicated electrical circuit, which is a real cost consideration if your panel is already near capacity. We’ll evaluate your existing gas and electrical infrastructure as part of design, before you fall in love with an appliance your current utilities can’t easily support.