Cost to Restain Cherry Cabinets

How Much will it cost to Restain Cherry Cabients?

If you have wood cabinets in your house and are ready for an update or refresh you have several options to consider. Should you replace cabinets, you could paint cabinets, refacing cabinets is an option, or maybe Restain the Cabients. Last week we started a project that is outside what we typically do- we started the task of cabinet staining! That has led to the question- What will it Cost to Restain Cherry Cabinets?

Can I Restain my Cabinets?

Before knowing cost – you should know if you can re stain cabinets. This video shows it best…

any type of water damage will make it almost impossible to re stain cabinets

So- you can stain! Now what?

We have been called, we have seen pics of your Cabinets and now it’s time to get an estimate. Here is where we get into the details that matter.

Cherry is a difficult wood to stain, so picking a stain color is the 1st step. Once you have a color, we will have to do a sample to make sure the stain is what your wanting.

Are you adding or getting rid of existing hardware? We ask this because if you have to fill holes- then matching the stain may be an issue- as not all wood fillers take the stain the same as the wood does.

Not all hinges are made the same

Knowing if you are going to replace any hinges- some hinges acannot be replaced. Older cabinet hinges or the style of the cabinet doors may result to not being able to get new hinges. If you are just swapping the same size and style of cabinet hinges for another then you should be good to go.

How long will it take to Restain wood Cabients?

Once we figure out what stain color you want for your Cabinets, the next question is usually- how long will this take? Great question! Re staining is time consuming. We are hoping that the typical sander can remove the clear coat and the stain as well. With 2 passes of 220 and 400 grit sandpaper.

The last job we figured 70 hours to sand off old finishes, stain, glaze and clear coat the cabinet doors- it took us 95.  Not fun. Two things we under estimated was the clear coat and the old glaze. The cherry cabinets had a very thick layer of clear coat on the cabinets which took 80 grit sandpaper!! 80 grit is very rough and not typical- so we had to use 120, 180, 220, 340, then 400 to get rid of the sanding marks we made to get rid of the older finishes.

We assume that fort the most part it wil take 2 hours per door.

Ok, so how much will it cost to Restain Cherry cabinets?!

Yeah, so we waited a bit to get to it, but we had to set expectations on what you can expect in the process of restaining. When we paint cabinets, we average 120-150 per door opening. (That included the boxes) For this it is more money- and probable close to the cost of refacing. It willl be close to 225-250 per door and opening. The sanding is messy, and takes a long time.

Problems with staining cherry cabinets

Let’s keep this ones short and sweet as we covered most of this in the video

• cherry has Gannon in it- which turns wood yellow or orange
• as cherry is red- you need to know how to kill the red undertones in the wood
• you need to use oil stains for best finishes
• clear coats for oil or modified stains are typically oil.
• Working with oil stain and clear coats are usually very smelly!
• Staining takes a long time! Each pice needs 4-8 hours to dry then 4-8 hours for clear coat to dry

Repairs is a little longer than a bullet point- if there are water stains, cracks, dents, old glue or other defects in the surface- re staining could be very difficult to achieve.

How can we help you with your cabinet refinishing?

From painting, staining or touch ups, we are here to help as best we can- If you have questions regarding cabinet paint or stain- let us know- We look forward to seeing how we can help you love the space your in!