Corian countertops - is it worth it to upgrade to in new house?

[lecach]

We just signed the contract on Monday for a new house. We have a meeting in 2 weeks to discuss the upgrade options. The house come with standard laminate countertops. We can upgrade to Corian for $3250 - then will also have to pay about $650 for either a Corian sink or a stainless sink. We're trying to decide if its worth it to pay almost $4000 for counters. We want to keep our upgrade costs down if possible. And just adding wood floors to the dining room and hall will be $2500. Then there is the upgraded carpet padding and linoleum. And the crown moulding (probablyjust downstairs). We also have to get a new washer and dryer and fridge. So can anyone help us make the decision? I know Corian lasts forever and its good for resale, but how important is it?

 

[jel0511]

as was explained to us during the upgrade process, counters are the easiest thing to change later. spend your money on something that's not as easy to replace later, like ceramix tile, hardwood floors, etc.

 

[ChristmasElf]

If you have the chance to put Corian in for $3250, I say go for it as it will be much higher later on if you decide to upgrade from the laminate.
Corian is a much nicer look than laminate. You will also get a lot more money when you sell your house later.

 

[MoniqueU]

I am very happy we have corian. If I was ever to buy a new house again or even a resale home it would have to have corian or granite etc.

 

[clarabelle]

I have corian in parts and laminate in parts. (A trick by the builder to get away with calling it a corian kitchen)
Anyway, The corian is white. It shows stains very easy. You are supposed to be able to sand them out -I just haven't tried it . You can bleach it (it does not take out all the stains) It is very durable and heat resisitant. It also shows streaks when you wipe it down.

The laminate is all around my cooktop -and has a burnt place on it and there is basically nothing you can do about it (except replace the countertop).

I would go with the look of it. If everytime you look at it you are wishing you had the other -I would consider it.
Laminate is inexpensive enough where you could change it frequently every few years with very little guilt. It comes in many more colors than is used to.

Also if you want an undermounted sink you cannot do laminate.

I am going to redo my kitchen soon and I may do granite!
I hope this helps!

 

[Brianne]

I guess it depends on if you think it's worth it?

For me personally, I wouldn't do it. I'd put laminate in & upgrade it later--I've never seen a builder who didn't overinflate upgrade prices. Otherwise, I'd go a step further & put granite in. My parents had Corian & swore they'd never get it again, I guess due to scratching. The buffing out that was recommended didn't work either. But their experience may have been unusual; I don't have it myself, but after hearing their complaints, we didn't have it installed in our home.

You'll get a wide range of opinions on here, but ultimately, do what you want to do & feel comfortable with, because you won't be happy otherwise!

 

[JESW]

I would say put them in. Here we are 9 years later updating our kitchen countertops to corian from the laminate we put in when we built the house. It will be costing us close to TWICE the cost you are quoted now - since it also involves labor and removal of the old stuff. I wish we had done it when we built.

Jill

 

[barkley]

when we looked at corian for our last home we decided against it because it was so costly and we did'nt know for sure if the color we liked "now" would be the same color we would like several years down the line (and given it's cost we would not likely feel it would be costwise to replace it out in a remodel that did'nt change the countertop structure).

i also think you need to look at how long you plan to live in the house-if you plan on selling is corian a valued feature in kitchens in your area (in ours they are usualy ripped out in favor of the more popular stones).

when we decided on our upgrades we went with the ones that we wanted that would cost us more to do post construction. we opted against some that were popular but we felt were of no benefit to us personaly and offered zero resale value (the biggie was interior vs. exterior hinging hardware on the kitchen cabinets).

another consideration is-if the upgrade is being rolled into the financing what is the ultimate price you will pay for it (with interest, points, etc.)-so while it may look like a "deal" to have the builder do it, in the long run paying cash after the fact for a more initialy expensive upgrade can result in much greater savings.

 

[lecach]

Corian is a valued feature in our area. But other things like hardwood floors are more valued. We would be rolling the upgrades into our financing. For every $1000 of upgrades we're looking at about $6 more per month. So if we do everything we want (Corian, wood in dining room and hall, upgraded carpet padding and linoleum, crown molding downstairs) we're looking at $8000-10000 or $48-60 more per month. If we drop the Corian our upgrades will cost an additional $24-36.

 

[jennyL]

Keep the new house questions coming. We go on the 15th for our first design meeting and then the final decisions are due on the 20th. My DH is already freaking out with what we think we want to do and we haven't even talked to the design center yet.

 

[720L]

I wouldn't get them, you can get laminate that looks like corian. Later on you can upgrade to granite. I would do the wood floors and crown molding for sure. Crown molding really dresses up a house.

 

[tar heel]

Is Corian expected in your house's price range? One thing that struck me is that you mentioned linoleum. My house has laminate counter tops and linoleum in the kitchen and I think the latter would be a bigger issue for resale. I'm a little bit out of the housebuilding loop, though -- when we built stainless was the "cheap" sink and you were supposed to upgrade to porcelain.

 

[sgtdisney]

It is really hard to say. I 2nd what the other poster said when it was mentioned counters are fairy easy to switch out later. We just built a new house and had to make this decision as well. Ultimately we decided to go with options that would be almost impossible to do later like putting a brick facade on and vaulting the ceilings, or we chose things we knew we really wanted right away like doing ceramic in all baths and kitchen and foyer and having an intercom system. I was leaning toward the quartz countertops but the builder wanted close to 6K for them so we passed. We ended up going with a 'premium' laminate which looks pretty similar to granite and had them bevel the edges of the counters so it didn't look like a standard laminate counter even that cost 500.00 but since we figured we would have the counters for 7 years or more until we change them out it was worth it.

I don't know how it is elsewhere, but someone in the industry here in Chicago told me that most of the larger builders here make little to no profit on houses built as 'standard.' Almost every penny of their profit comes from those little visits to the design center when you find everything they display in the models and everything you want is extra.

Good luck in your decision. I know it isn't easy to have to pare things back when you want it all in a new house.

 

[puffkin]

I really wanted to do the Corian countertops when we built our house last year, but decided to go with the laminate for a various reasons. It mainly came down to we got a Kitchen Island built in for cheaper than the Corian. Another concern was that granite was much more valued in our area than Corian. We weren't sure if it would add enough value to the house. Also, we figured though it would be costly, this is one of the easier things we could change later, should we decide to do it. Finally, laminate is pretty standard in our homes price range/development.

 

[Longsx3]

I would price out cost of updating to Corian on your own vs what the builder is charging you. Actually I would do that with several of the upgrades you are considering...I always heard that crown molding was relatively easy to do. If the builders isn't adding a huge markup than for ease I would have him do the upgrades but if you could do it a lot cheaper than I would wait.

 

[golfgal]

Personally I wouldn't go with Corain, I would go with a granite or Silestone. The price should be comparable and you don't need to worry about scratching or scorching like you do with Corian. Corian in a bathroom would be nice though.

 

[redshoes]

We are currently building our second home and opted for the upgrade of solid surface countertops in the kitchen and bathrooms. Something that helped me a lot was going to a countertop only store and talking with the salesman. He was able to let me see the different options in materials and he was honest about the benefits and drawbacks of all of them. He was not associated with our builder at all (however, we ended up ordering through him anyways- because he was much cheaper than what our builder wanted to charge us) and so he could give me his honest opinion without having a financial stake in the game (at least at that time). The one thing that we have done with this house that is a little different than when we first built is that we have looked at upgrades and asked ourselves, "if we dont upgrade will we be wishing we had after we've moved in and been there a week?" On the hand, "if we do it is it worth it to pay for it for 30 years?" For me it's given me a better view of what I want and what I don't. Some things we did the upgrade on, some we didn't, and a few will have to wait until a later date. Good luck with your decision, I hope that things go smooth for you.
Kate

 

[MAKmom]

We have a countertop bussiness. Self edge laminate tops are cheap. Beveled edge laminate tops can look like Corian. If your sink price is for a double sink its about right. The price of Corian is coming down since they lost thier patent. Corian does have sale colors. How much counter top do you have?

 

[rt2dz]

I would not want laminate. I'd go with granite or silestone personally. I don't think corian is worth the money.

However, I'd price the difference between doing it yourself or having the builder do it--with all upgrades. When I had my house built, we did that with everything and found some things to be a better deal with builder (carpet
7 carpet pad upgrades), some things easier with the builder (rounded corners, extra outlets) and others cheaper to do it myself (fixture upgrades, tile, wood floors, crown molding, blinds, appliances). Also ask yourself, how long before you can afford to upgrade--don't finance later upgrades.

As far as the cost in resale, how long do you plan on being in this house? In 20 years something even better than granote/silestone might be out there but not as likely in 5 years. And what are other home owners doing--those will be the homes your house will be competing with when up for sale. You don't want yours to be on a much lower level nor is it important to be ahead of the others. You want to be in the middle of the pack here.

 

[Am_I_There_Yet]

as was explained to us during the upgrade process, counters are the easiest thing to change later. spend your money on something that's not as easy to replace later, like ceramix tile, hardwood floors, etc.

This is the advice I give my clients when building. Sink your money into the surfaces that will take the most abuse and the ones that when upgraded, will last longer, like nicer carpet on thicker padding. (I had my last carpet seven years when I sold my home and it still looked brand, spanking-new! We upgraded it five times when we built.)

We recently remodeled our kitchen and put in granite. We got it much cheaper than what the big box stores, and builders charge. We got the stone on our own and hired a fabricator to install it. We paid under $3k. I LOVE it.

Here's a link to our kitchen: http://pg.photos.yahoo.com/ph/smbno...://pg.photos.yahoo.com/ph/smbnobles/my_photos