Kitchen cabinets: a $15,438 job, and who gets paid along the way

New cabinets for an average kitchen, priced piece by piece, and where your money goes between the factory and your wall.

The vinyl on the cabinet door next to your stove is peeling at the corner, and every pot you own lives in one wobbly stack behind a single door. It’s time for new cabinets. On the sample bid we built from published prices, replacing them comes to $15,438, and the cabinets themselves are a little under half of that. You’d also like to trade the laminate counter for quartz while the kitchen is torn apart, so we priced that too, as a separate add-on. Every number comes from public sources, mostly cost guides like HomeGuide and HomeAdvisor.

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The short version

• Replacing the cabinets costs $15,438 on our sample bid. The cabinets are $7,500 of it. The rest pays for the handles, tearing out the old cabinets, fixing the wall, installation, the plumber and the contractor’s fee.
• A quartz counter and a new sink at the same time add $4,956, so the whole job comes to $20,394.
• Going by two big companies’ averages, a little under half of the $7,500 you pay for the cabinets covers building them. The store keeps about a third, and the cabinet maker keeps the rest.
• Tonight, pull out any cabinet quote you have and check which jobs it actually covers.

The setup

Your kitchen is 12 feet by 12 feet, about the national average,² in a house built in the early 2000s. It’s the room where everyone ends up standing at a party. The cabinets run in an L along two walls, about 24 feet of them in all, which is also about average,² and they’re the plain ones the builder put in. The doors are thermofoil, a thin vinyl skin wrapped over fiberboard,⁶ and that skin is what’s peeling. The counter is laminate, with a lip glued up the wall behind it.

Cabinets like these, off-the-shelf boxes of fiberboard, are the cheaper kind. Off-the-shelf cabinets come in fewer sizes and styles, and fiberboard is cheaper than plywood and solid wood.¹ Still, the layout works, and moving cabinets around can mean extra work inside the walls,² so the L stays where it is.

Here’s what you want: better cabinets in the same spots, with deep drawers where the pots go. The kind priced here is called semi-custom, the middle grade between off-the-shelf and fully custom.¹ The counter is a separate choice. You’d like the laminate gone, so we also priced a quartz counter with a sink mounted underneath it, so the edge runs smooth and flush.^3, 4 Your faucet and dishwasher stay. One general contractor orders everything and schedules each trade, for a price agreed before work starts.

The bid, piece by piece

The chart shows the whole sample bid, counter included, biggest cost first. If you want every number, open the table under it.

See every number behind the bars (the full table)

Item	Low	Typical	High	Materials	Labor and fees	Share
1. Cabinets, semi-custom, 24 feet along the walls, with hinges	$1,800	$7,500	$13,200	$7,500	none	37%
2. Quartz countertop, 36 sq ft, mid-grade, installed	$2,700	$3,330	$3,960	$2,610	$720	16%
3. Undermount sink	$150	$575	$1,000	$575	none	3%
4. Cabinet handles and knobs, 30	$60	$780	$1,500	$780	none	4%
5. Tear-out and haul-away: old cabinets and countertop	$410	$645	$880	none	$645	3%
6. Walls patched where the old cabinets came off	$300	$600	$900	$240	$360	3%
7. Cabinet installation: hang, level, fit doors and handles	$1,800	$2,700	$3,600	none	$2,700	13%
8. Plumbing: set the sink, reconnect faucet and dishwasher	$430	$865	$1,300	none	$865	4%
9. General contractor fee, 20 percent of items 1 to 8	$1,530	$3,399	$5,268	none	$3,399	17%
Total	$9,180	$20,394	$31,608	$11,705	$8,689	100%

Built from published price ranges. The contractor’s fee is 20 percent of items 1 to 8, shares are rounded to add to 100 percent, and the math is under “How we built the bid”.

It’s easier to read in two parts. The cabinet job is $15,438: the cabinets, the handles, tearing out the old ones, patching the wall, installation, the plumber, and the contractor’s fee on all of that. The quartz, the new sink and hauling off the old counter add $4,956, including the contractor’s fee on them. The split is in “How we built the bid”.

The rust bars in the chart are what we call The Backstage Costs: the work you don’t shop for but still pay for. Here they come to $8,209, or 40 percent of the whole job, counter included.

Why does HomeAdvisor say cabinets cost $6,191?

HomeAdvisor’s customers report paying $6,191 on average to have cabinets installed.² On this bid, your cabinets plus their installation come to $10,200, which is more than that average. The reason is that the average mixes all sorts of jobs together, from a single new cabinet to a big custom kitchen, and the grade of cabinet moves the price more than anything else.² Yours are mid-range semi-custom cabinets for a full kitchen, so they cost more than an average that includes cheap cabinets and small jobs.

An average also can’t show you who gets paid along the way. Before cabinets reach your kitchen, they pass through several hands. The maker sells them to a dealer or a big store,⁸ the store adds its markup,⁷ and your contractor adds a fee on top.⁹ Each one takes a cut of your price. We call that chain The Vendor Stack. A quote that lists your cabinets as one number hides all of it.

Where does the $7,500 for the cabinets go?

The cabinets get ordered first, and the $7,500 you pay for them already includes everyone’s cut except your contractor’s. Two big companies report their overall numbers every year, and together they give a rough picture of how that $7,500 splits.

Home Depot, across everything it sells, keeps about a third of the price after paying for the goods.⁷ MasterBrand, a cabinet maker that sells through dealers and the big home stores, spends a little under 70 percent of what it takes in on making its products.⁸

Put those together on your $7,500. The store keeps about a third and pays the maker the rest. The maker spends most of what it gets on building the cabinets, which comes to a little under half of your $7,500, and keeps what’s left for its other bills and its profit. Then your contractor’s fee adds another $1,500 on top. That chain, from the factory to the fee, is The Vendor Stack on your cabinets.

Where you buy also changes what a quote shows. Big home stores often supply the installers as part of the project price,² so their quote may not split the cabinets from the installation the way this bid does. Before you compare the two, ask the store: “Is installation included in this cabinet price, and what exactly does it cover?”

Do the old cabinets have to come out?

For your kitchen, yes, because drawers where the pots go mean new cabinet boxes. On demo day the crew lifts off the old counter, unhooks the sink and dishwasher, pulls out the old cabinets and hauls everything away, for $645 on this bid. Many contractors fold the tear-out into their price,¹ so it may not show up on your quote as its own item.

If you didn’t need the drawers, there’s a cheaper path called refacing, as long as your cabinet boxes are still solid.⁶ Refacing keeps the boxes, covers the outside of the boxes in a thin new skin of veneer, and adds new doors, drawer fronts, hinges and handles.⁶ For your kitchen it would come to about $7,200, which is $3,000 less than new cabinets installed (the math is in “How we built the bid”).

Refinishing costs less still. It means sanding the cabinets you have and painting or staining them, and it tops out around $4,200.⁶ But a refinish doesn’t last as long as new cabinets,² and the pots stay in their stack.

Ask the contractor: “Is tearing out and hauling away the old cabinets and counter included in your price?”

What happens to the wall behind them?

With the old cabinets off, the wall behind them is full of screw holes and torn patches. Patching it comes to $600 on this bid, and most of that is labor.¹¹

The bigger choice here is the strip of wall between the counter and the upper cabinets. This bid leaves it as patched, painted drywall. A tile backsplash would add a couple of hundred dollars for something simple and $2,000 or more for fancier tile.³ You can tile now while the kitchen is already torn up, or paint now and tile later. Peel-and-stick backsplash tile is another way to cover that strip later. Check this before you sign: “Does your patch price include paint, and is a backsplash in your price or not?”

What does $2,700 of installation pay for?

Now the new cabinets go up. Installation costs $2,700 on this bid,¹ and it pays for hanging the cabinets, getting them level, fastening them to the wall, and fitting the doors, drawers and handles.

Getting them level matters more than usual here, because quartz is coming. A stone counter set on cabinets that aren’t level can crack.³ Your $2,700 includes it, but some installers bill it separately by the hour.³

One choice belongs here: how tall the upper cabinets go. Your old ones stop short of the ceiling, and this bid keeps that height. Running the new ones all the way up gives you more storage, but it adds 10 percent or more to the cabinet cost,¹ about $750 on your cabinets. Try this on the installer: “Does your price include leveling the cabinets for a stone counter and putting on the handles?”

Why does the plumber come after the counter?

On this bid, your new sink hangs under the quartz,⁴ so the plumber comes once the counter is down. Then the plumber sets the sink, hooks up the faucet and drain, and reconnects the dishwasher. That costs $865.

Sometimes the counter installer sets the sink and the plumber only connects it.⁴ So find out who’s doing what: “Is setting the sink in the plumber’s price or the counter installer’s, and who reconnects the dishwasher?”

How much does the contractor’s fee add?

The contractor’s fee is $3,399, which is 20 percent of everything else on the whole job, counter included, and the high end of what’s typical.^9, 10 It pays for one company to order the cabinets, schedule each trade and run the job from start to finish. Of that fee, $1,500 is charged on the cabinets themselves.

That $1,500 is the part of the fee to ask about if you’d rather buy the cabinets yourself. Settle it before anything ships, and get the answer in writing: “Does your fee apply to cabinets I buy myself, and who handles a cabinet that arrives damaged?”

The four things you pick, and the catch in each

You shop for four things on this bid: the cabinets, the quartz, the kitchen sink and the cabinet handles. Together they’re $12,185, and each has one catch.

Cabinets, $7,500. That’s a mid-range price for semi-custom cabinets.¹ Plywood boxes with solid wood doors cost more than fiberboard, and a cabinet full of drawers costs more than one with a door,¹ so the drawers you want can push the price up.

Quartz counter, $3,330. Mid-grade quartz is the kind sold most often.³ The catch is the edge. A plain square or slightly rounded edge costs nothing extra, while a fancier shape is charged by the foot.³

Sink, $575. A sink mounted under the counter is heavy and may need extra support underneath.⁴ A drop-in sink, which sits on top of the counter, is the easiest kind to put in.⁴ If you pick the undermount kitchen sink yourself, choose it before the quartz is cut, because the hole is cut to fit the sink.

Handles, $780. The $780 covers 30 handles and knobs at about $26 apiece. If you’d rather choose them yourself, cabinet pulls and knobs are sold in multipacks. Hinges are the other thing to check, because they should show up on your quote too.² Ask the cabinet dealer: “Are the hinges included in the cabinet price, and are the handles actually priced or just a placeholder amount?”

Three budgets for the same kitchen

On this bid, the cabinet grade moves your total more than any other choice. The chart shows the whole job, counter included, with three grades of cabinet and everything else the same.

Going up to fully custom cabinets adds more than twice what the quartz counter adds. Dropping to off-the-shelf cabinets saves about as much as skipping the quartz counter.

The finished room

When it’s done, your pots slide out on drawers instead of tumbling out of a stack. The counter is cool, smooth quartz, and the sink’s edge sits flush, so crumbs wipe straight in. A lot of what you paid for, you’ll never see: the shims holding the cabinets level under the stone, the patched wall behind them, the plumber’s afternoon, and The Vendor Stack folded into every cabinet, from the factory to the fee.

What to do tonight

Tonight, pull out any cabinet quote you have and look for these jobs: tearing out the old cabinets, installation, leveling for a stone counter, the plumber, patching the wall and the contractor’s fee. For each one, ask whether it’s included in another price, listed as a placeholder amount, or missing. If a quote prices the cabinets by the foot, run a tape measure along your cabinets and check the footage it lists. Tomorrow, ask the seller what the cabinet boxes and doors are made of, because plywood and solid wood cost more than fiberboard.¹ If you want a one-page sheet for comparing three bids side by side, drop your email here.

How we built the bid

Items 1 to 8 use the middle of each published national range.

• Cabinets, $7,500. Semi-custom cabinets with their hardware run $75 to $550 a linear foot; the middle, $312.50, times 24 feet.¹ We’ve assumed delivery is included.
• Quartz, $3,330. 36 square feet of mid-grade quartz at $75 to $110 a square foot installed, middle $92.50. The slab at $65 to $80, middle $72.50, is $2,610, and labor at $10 to $30, middle $20, is $720.³
• Sink, $575. The middle of $150 to $1,000 for an undermount sink.⁴
• Handles, $780. 30 at $26, the middle of $2 to $50.²
• Tear-out, $645. 24 feet at $17.50, the middle of $15 to $20, is $420,¹ plus $225 for the countertop, the middle of $50 to $400.³
• Walls, $600. The middle of HomeAdvisor’s $300 to $900 for drywall patching,² with 60 percent counted as labor, the middle of 50 to 70 percent.¹¹
• Installation, $2,700. 24 feet at $112.50, the middle of $75 to $150.¹
• Plumbing, $865. $515 to set the sink, the middle of $230 to $800,⁴ plus $350 for the dishwasher, the middle of $200 to $500.⁵
• Contractor fee, $3,399. 20 percent of the $16,995 of trades, the top of the 10 to 20 percent range,^9, 10 our rule on every bid.
• Cabinet job and counter add-on. The cabinet job is the cabinets, handles, $420 of the tear-out, walls, installation and plumbing: $12,865, plus a $2,573 fee, 20 percent of it, for $15,438. The plumber sits in the cabinet job because on this bid the sink and dishwasher get hooked back up whichever counter goes on. The counter add-on is the quartz, the sink and $225 of the tear-out: $4,130, plus an $826 fee, for $4,956.
• Where the $7,500 goes. Home Depot kept 33.3 percent of its fiscal 2025 sales after paying for the goods.⁷ A seller at that share, worked unrounded, paid $5,001 for $7,500 of cabinets and kept $2,499. MasterBrand’s cost of products sold was 69.7 percent of its sales.⁸ At that share, building the cabinets costs $3,488 of the $5,001, and the maker keeps $1,513. Your contractor’s 20 percent on the $7,500 is $1,500.
• Survey, refacing and refinishing. HomeAdvisor’s survey average is $6,191.² Refacing runs $150 to $450 a linear foot,⁶ so the middle, $300, times 24 is $7,200, which is $3,000 less than the $10,200 for new cabinets installed. Refinishing runs $1,800 to $4,200.⁶ Taller upper cabinets add 10 percent or more, $750 on $7,500.¹
• Three grades. Off-the-shelf uses $165 and $85 a foot for cabinets and installation, the middles of $50 to $280 and $50 to $120, for $15,354. Custom uses $600 and $250, the middles of $300 to $900 and $200 to $300, for $32,634.¹ Custom costs $12,240 more than the $20,394 bid, more than twice the $4,956 counter add-on. Off-the-shelf costs $5,040 less than the bid.

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Sources

1. HomeGuide, “How Much Does Cabinet Installation Cost? (New 2026 Prices)” (2023-04-06). https://homeguide.com/costs/cabinet-installation-cost – retrieved 2026-10-25.
2. HomeAdvisor, “How Much Does Cabinet Installation Cost in 2026?” (2026-06-20). https://www.homeadvisor.com/cost/cabinets-and-countertops/install-cabinets/ – retrieved 2026-10-25.
3. HomeGuide, “How Much Do Quartz Countertops Cost? (2026)” (2023-12-14). https://homeguide.com/costs/quartz-countertops-cost – retrieved 2026-10-25.
4. HomeGuide, “2026 Sink Installation Cost | Replace Kitchen / Bathroom Sink” (2025-10-16). https://homeguide.com/costs/sink-installation-cost – retrieved 2026-10-25.
5. HomeGuide, “How Much Does Dishwasher Installation Cost? (2026)” (2024-01-19). https://homeguide.com/costs/dishwasher-installation-cost – retrieved 2026-10-25.
6. HomeAdvisor, “How Much Does Cabinet Refacing Cost in 2026?” (2026-06-20). https://www.homeadvisor.com/cost/cabinets-and-countertops/reface-cabinets/ – retrieved 2026-10-25.
7. The Home Depot, “The Home Depot Announces Fourth Quarter and Fiscal 2025 Results; Increases Quarterly Dividend by 1.3%; Provides Fiscal 2026 Guidance” (2026-02-24). https://ir.homedepot.com/~/media/Files/H/HomeDepot-IR/press-release/q4-2025-earnings-release.pdf – retrieved 2026-10-25.
8. MasterBrand, Inc. (SEC filing), “Form 10-K for the fiscal year ended December 28, 2025” (2026-02-13). https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1941365/000194136526000006/mbc-20251228.htm – retrieved 2026-10-25.
9. HomeGuide, “2026 General Contractor Charges, Hourly Rates & Fee Percentage” (2023-09-05). https://homeguide.com/costs/general-contractor-cost – retrieved 2026-10-24.
10. HomeAdvisor, “How Much Is a General Contractor’s Hourly Rate in 2026?” (2026-06-20). https://www.homeadvisor.com/cost/additions-and-remodels/general-contractor-rates/ – retrieved 2026-10-24.
11. HomeGuide, “How Much Does Drywall Repair Cost? (2026)” (2025-10-20). https://homeguide.com/costs/drywall-repair-cost – retrieved 2026-10-24.

About this article

How this article was made: The Homeowner Files uses AI tools to help research, draft and illustrate articles. Every cost figure traces to a public source listed under Sources, and a person reviews and approves each article before it publishes.

All content on The Homeowner Files reflects general industry knowledge and publicly available data. It is not construction, legal, financial, or professional advice. Consult licensed professionals for your specific project. None of it reflects the views, positions, or confidential information of any employer.