What a kitchen remodel in Potomac actually involves
Large custom colonials and 1980s and 1990s builder homes with two-story foyers, formal front rooms and kitchens sized for an era when the kitchen was not the room everyone lived in.
- Demolition and what is behind the walls. Cabinets out, old flooring up, and the wall cavities opened. This is the point where undersized wiring, galvanized supply lines, a vent stack in the wrong place or a bearing wall where you wanted an opening stops being a theory.
- Structural changes and openings. Removing or shortening a wall between the kitchen and an adjacent room means a properly sized header or beam, a load path carried down to the foundation, and in most jurisdictions a structural detail submitted with the permit.
- Ventilation done properly. A range hood that vents to the outside through insulated duct with a correct termination, not a recirculating filter and not a duct dumped into the attic. This is one of the most commonly cut corners in the trade.
- Cabinetry, counters and tile. Cabinets set level and shimmed to a floor that is never actually flat, counters templated after installation rather than from drawings, and tile that is laid out from a real center line.
What we typically find on a Potomac house of this era (1965 to 1998). In Potomac the recurring finds are oversized rooms with undersized mechanical systems, two-story spaces that were never zoned separately and are therefore never comfortable, and on septic parcels, a drainfield sitting exactly where the owner wanted the addition.
Lead paint: the rule that applies to older Potomac homes
Federal law — the EPA's Renovation, Repair and Painting rule — requires that work disturbing painted surfaces in a home built before 1978 be performed by a certified firm using contained work practices, with specific cleanup afterward. A meaningful share of Potomac homes predate 1978, and the older neighborhoods here almost certainly do. We are certified for this work and it is built into how we set up, not bolted on. Worth asking every other contractor bidding your job whether they are, and asking to see it.
What drives the cost on a Potomac kitchen remodel
We will not put a price range on a web page, because a number quoted without seeing your house is either a guess or bait. What we can do is tell you honestly which variables move the number, so you can read the bids you get from anyone.
- Whether a wall comes out, and whether it is bearing. A non-bearing wall is a day. A bearing wall is engineering, a beam, temporary shoring and a load path to the foundation.
- Cabinet tier. Stock, semi-custom and full-custom cabinetry span an enormous range, and cabinetry is usually the single largest line on a kitchen budget.
- What the demolition exposes. Rot under a long-leaking sink, failed subfloor, or plumbing that has to be replaced to be legally connected to.
The mistakes we get called in to fix
- A recirculating range hood in a house with a gas range. It moves smell around. It does not move moisture, grease or combustion byproducts out of the house.
- Buying the appliances last. Cabinet openings are built to specific appliance dimensions, and a counter-depth refrigerator that is two inches deeper than planned means a rebuilt cabinet run.
- Hiring the trades separately and assuming they will coordinate. They will not, because none of them is being paid to.
One licensed team, one contract, one point of contact
This is the clearest case in residential construction for a single contract. When a homeowner hires a cabinet company, an electrician, a plumber and a tile setter separately, nobody owns the sequence — and the sequence is the entire job. The cabinet installer shows up before the electrician has passed rough-in, the counters get templated off cabinets that have to move, and every delay becomes an argument about whose fault it was.
Our position is simple and it is checkable. We hold MHIC #111971 in Maryland. We carry general liability and workers' compensation coverage, and we will send you the certificates before you sign rather than after you ask twice. Our subcontracted trades carry their own coverage and their own trade licenses, and the trade permits are pulled under those licenses, as they are required to be. You sign one contract with one company, and that company is the one answering the phone when something needs answering.
Where we work in Potomac
- 20854
- 20859
- Potomac Village
- Avenel
- River Falls
- Falconhurst
- Glen Hills
- Bedfordshire
How a Potomac project runs
- A free visit that produces a document, not a pitch. No presentation, no same-day discount, no financing conversation before anyone has looked at the house. We measure, we photograph, we ask what is not working, and we leave you with something written you can compare against every other bid.
- Feasibility against Potomac rules, before design. We establish what the Montgomery County Department of Permitting Services will require for kitchen remodel at your address, and what your lot, your zoning and your existing house will allow.
- Everything priced and agreed before a permit is filed. You see the scope broken into line items, the allowances stated as real numbers rather than vague placeholders, and the process for handling anything discovered mid-project. Only then does the permit package get assembled and submitted, with us answering the reviewer rather than forwarding comments to you.
- One crew, one schedule, one closeout. MHIC #111971, Our own supervision on site, inspections met by us, and a documented punch walk with the permits closed out at the end.
Free Potomac kitchen remodel consultation
We walk the space, tell you what the Montgomery County Department of Permitting Services will require, and give you a written scope. No obligation, and the permit guidance is yours either way.
Kitchen Remodeling across Potomac and Montgomery County
Potomac Village, Avenel, River Falls, Falconhurst, Glen Hills and Bedfordshire are all inside our regular working area, along with 20854, 20859. Potomac's problem is rarely square footage; it is that the square footage is chopped into formal rooms nobody uses. The highest-return work here is reorganization, not expansion.
Homeowners here usually reach us for more than one thing at a time. Related work in Potomac: bathroom remodeling in Potomac, basement finishing in Potomac, home additions in Potomac, interior painting in Potomac.
There is a specific failure mode we exist to prevent: the interior contractor who opens a wall, finds water damage, and hands you a roofer's phone number. Because roofing, siding, aluminum siding, windows and gutters, soffit and fascia are trades we perform ourselves, the envelope is inside your contract rather than outside it, and there is no second company to schedule, vet and argue with.
Potomac kitchen remodeling questions
Do I need a permit for a kitchen remodel in Potomac, MD?
Your reviewing authority is the Montgomery County Department of Permitting Services. A kitchen remodel needs a permit in essentially every jurisdiction we work in once it touches electrical, plumbing, gas or structure — which is nearly every real kitchen project. We confirm the requirement for your specific parcel rather than generalizing, because in this region the answer genuinely changes across a municipal boundary. We pull the permits and meet the inspections as part of the contract.
Are you licensed to do this work in Potomac?
Yes, and you should not take our word for it. MHIC #111971 is searchable through the Maryland Department of Labor's licensing lookup. Ask us for the certificate of insurance before you sign, and ask every other bidder for the same two things.
What is actually different about doing this work in Potomac?
The 1980s and 1990s Potomac floor plan gives you a large but isolated kitchen, a formal living room that sits empty, and a dated primary bath. Reworking those three is usually a better investment than adding a wing. One-acre-plus zoning through much of the area, with a meaningful share of Glen Hills and outer Potomac properties on private well and septic rather than public utilities.
Do I need a permit to remodel a kitchen?
If the project touches electrical, plumbing, gas or structure, yes. That covers most real kitchen remodels. A pure cosmetic swap — same cabinets in the same footprint, same appliances, no wiring or plumbing changes — is the narrow exception. When in doubt, the permit is the cheap answer. Unpermitted work is discovered at resale, and resolving it retroactively means opening finished walls.