# Too good to pass up?



## Maybe Later (Feb 19, 2011)

I've been thinking about "deals" vs. spending. A good deal is a no brainer when it is something you would buy anyway. It's a waste of money if you spend it on something you meither want nor can use. But what about in the middle? How many of you have a philosophy on deals?

Case in point:

Our 5 year old house has a problem with a countertop. It is notnig fancy, but it's about a 14 foot run of laminate with two corners. The kitchen installer will replace it - no cost to me except a bit of plumbing which I can do myself.

Or ... 

They'll credit us roughly $5K (the initial cost of the countertops) towards stone, which we wanted, but couldn't justify when we built the house. New outlay (with a nicer sink) will be an additional 6K or so. I'm confiden't they're not inflating the cost of the job and then deducting the credit.

So, we can get exactly what we have for nothing, or granite in the kitchen at a great deal. Now, we weren't looking to upgrade right now, butit is something that we'd like. The money could be saved, put against the mortgage, go to underfunded emergency funds ... whatever, since we weren't actively saving for it. And I also don't think that it will increase the value of our home to have enough of an arguement there. 

I know what we're going to do . What would you do?


----------



## KaeJS (Sep 28, 2010)

I'd get the granite and go for the deal.


----------



## Dana (Nov 17, 2009)

If you are determined that you will get granite anyway, eventually, ask yourself if you will be able to get a 'deal' similar to this when you are ready. If this is a one-off opportunity and it is on something you would have done anyway, I would take advantage of it.


----------



## knobert (Feb 25, 2011)

I would get acouple other quotes, the pricing seems really high to me. And I bought grabite during the boom.


----------



## knobert (Feb 25, 2011)

I would get another quote, it seems expensive


----------



## Plugging Along (Jan 3, 2011)

+1... I look at the likelyhood of the deal happening again, if I am going to want it in the future, and this is a good deal now, then I would get it too. If I can easily get it in the future, or really didn't want it that much then no.


----------



## slacker (Mar 8, 2010)

Only poor people use laminate, they look cheap and tacky.


----------



## Maybe Later (Feb 19, 2011)

slacker said:


> Only poor people use laminate, they look cheap and tacky.


Funny, I think they coined the term "house-poor" to describe all those non-tacky people with lovely homes that have beautiful countertops, but that they can barely pay for.


----------



## Maybe Later (Feb 19, 2011)

knobert said:


> I would get acouple other quotes, the pricing seems really high to me. And I bought grabite during the boom.


I can see where you'd get there. There's another 14-15 linear feet in the kitchen and a shelf. They'd just fix the one 14 foot piece if we went that way.

I have to say I'm surprised. I thought I'd hear a lot more, "Why spend the money if you don't have to?"


----------



## Barwelle (Feb 23, 2011)

Maybe Later said:


> I have to say I'm surprised. I thought I'd hear a lot more, "Why spend the money if you don't have to?"


You can put me in that camp. You would be getting a brand new countertop for free. Granite is nice but laminate does the same job.

Why buy a mustang when a Civic will do.

I guess it comes down to how much you value appearances. I am a frugal functional person so I would go with the laminate. 

Disclosure: I own a Civic lol.

Although granite is more functional because you don't need cutting boards... I would probably still go with the laminate anyway. Especially since it would take me 2.5 months to make 6k after tax at my current salary!


----------



## slacker (Mar 8, 2010)

Maybe Later said:


> I have to say I'm surprised. I thought I'd hear a lot more, "Why spend the money if you don't have to?"


At the end of the day, if it's really something you wanted, you would had shopped around and done the research for it already. The fact that you haven't means that it's not a priority.

Generally speaking, I'm in the camp on spending wisely on things that will make you happy. If the $6k spent on counter top will get you the most happiness for you and your family, then why not.

But I use the following question as a sober second thought. Is there a better alternative for that $6k? $6k will pay for a decent vacation for you and your family. $6k can almost pay for a whole years university tuition for one of your kids. Do you really prefer to get a granite counter top over those alternatives?

According to this article, buying experience instead of things will grant you greater happiness over the long run:

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/02/090207150518.htm


----------



## HaroldCrump (Jun 10, 2009)

Barwelle said:


> Why buy a mustang when a Civic will do.


Why buy a Civic when a Cruze will do? 
Not fair to compare a Mustang with a Civic.


----------



## Four Pillars (Apr 5, 2009)

Definitely shop around. Granite really helps the resale value, so it might be worth doing for that alone.


----------



## andrewf (Mar 1, 2010)

Barwelle said:


> Although granite is more functional because you don't need cutting boards...


You should still use a cutting board with granite. Steel on stone is bad for your knives, and granite is porous. 

If I were going for stone counters, I'd go with quartz myself.


----------



## Financial Cents (Jul 22, 2010)

"Generally speaking, I'm in the camp on spending wisely on things that will make you happy. If the $6k spent on counter top will get you the most happiness for you and your family, then why not."

+1

Well said.

Some folks would never spend $6k on a counter top. Then again, others would easily spend that kind of money on a trip to Italy for 2 weeks.


----------



## Barwelle (Feb 23, 2011)

HaroldCrump said:


> Why buy a Civic when a Cruze will do?
> Not fair to compare a Mustang with a Civic.


Civics and Cruzes are comparable in price but Hondas have a better history of reliability than Chevs do.

But my point was to compare a more expensive vehicle to a less expensive vehicle that would still do the same thing... which would be to take you places. I could easily have used the Cruze in my comparison instead of the Civic.

Maybe this would be a better analogy: If you were looking for a commuter vehicle to get you from A to B, why buy a Camaro when a Cruze will do? Unless you like the sports car style enough to justify the extra cost up front and higher gas bills. 

Why get granite when laminate will do? Unless you like the granite enough to justify paying more for it.



andrewf said:


> You should still use a cutting board with granite. Steel on stone is bad for your knives, and granite is porous.
> 
> If I were going for stone counters, I'd go with quartz myself.


I didn't know that about the knives. Good to know. Granite is porous... so you would get bacteria growing on the counter, because you could never fully clean it? I don't imagine spilled liquids would seep through a granite counter.


----------



## Addy (Mar 12, 2010)

If I were in your shoes I would base it on how long I would be in the house or how much it increases resale.


----------



## houska (Feb 6, 2010)

Hmm. Something doesn't compute here. When we did our kitchen reno 2 years ago, the prices for granite were from $50 (low end) to $120/sq ft of granite countertop. In comparison, I think good quality laminate was around $20 (no longer quite sure). Double that for the cost per linear foot of countertop. You say you have 14 linear feet, so I'd expect an incremental cost - for the granite countertop - of $1000-3000. You said you had corners, maybe you have a fancy edge, maybe prices have risen, maybe there's other things involved, yada, yada - but I can't see how the incremental cost of granite vs laminate would be $6k on this scenario.

Regarding whether to buy the granite in the first place - think the others have it right on the personal pleasure component. Re resale value, to keep it simple, just consider other homes in your pricerange in your community. If they have fancy kitchens, and you are bringing yours "up to par" you can suppose you'd recover a reasonable fraction of the cost on resale. If not, it's a personal preference that you're unlikely to recover on resale. Also worth asking is whether the rest of the kitchen is up to par - if people want an upscale kitchen, will they like yours, or will they say "we'll have to replace the kitchen - shame about the granite, that's pretty nice, but it has to go too".


----------



## Maybe Later (Feb 19, 2011)

Thanks for the comments all. Been away for a dew days. 

As far as the cost, it is the difference between replacing one 14 foot length to match vs. new stone in the whole kitchen, which is 5 additional pieces and roughly the same linear feet again. I also factored in the cost of a higher end sink. 

As I'd indicated, I knew what we planned to do before I wrote the post, but I appreciate all the ideas. I think for us it comes down to the personal enjoyment. When we built the house we really tried to keep the price down to avoid CMHC (and did). This was to be an eventual upgrade if we were to stay here long term, the damage just sped up the process.

For me it is the same as our winter tires. Here, they are optional, but we have them on both vehicles. When the weather is nasty I get a lot of satisfaction out of having spent that money. At the same time though, I get more satisfaction out of the performance of my wife's vehicle that has mid-level tires that we added studs to than I do out of the premium winter tires on mine that cost a lot more.


----------

