Kitchen remodeling on the North Carolina coast

How we assess a house explains the record we start from. Each decision goes into your private online workspace, with the reason behind it. When the kitchen is one room of a larger job, whole-house renovation covers the wider plan.

What you decide

• The layout, and whether a wall comes out
• Gas, electric or induction
• The hood, and how much air it moves
• Built-in or freestanding appliances
• Cabinets, counters and finishes

We lay out what each choice sets off. A load-bearing wall coming out brings a beam and a permit. A bigger hood can call for makeup air, fresh air brought in to replace what it pulls out. A move to gas brings new piping and a pressure test.

A new kitchen in the same layout

Some owners like where everything sits and want the rest new. A whole new kitchen with nothing moved is a job we take on too. It gets the same assessment and permit check as a kitchen that moves every wall.

How the work runs

The work behind the walls is inspected while it can still be seen, before cabinets and drywall cover it.

What the walls hide is priced as an allowance.

Damage that only shows once the cabinets and walls come out is carried as an allowance in the price. The assessment records what can be seen before the work starts.

When the kitchen is out of service

A kitchen remodel has a stretch with no working kitchen. When the kitchen goes out of service, and for how long, is set before work begins, so you can plan around it. Living through a renovation covers how the rest of the house stays usable.

A second kitchen is its own question.

A second kitchen for a guest suite or a relative can turn that space into an accessory dwelling. Southport's code, for one, defines an accessory dwelling as a complete, independent living space with its own cooking, eating, sanitation and sleeping. Accessory dwelling units covers that path.

Older houses bring two more checks.

A house built before 1978 falls under North Carolina's lead-safe renovation rules. On older houses, an NC-accredited inspector tests suspect materials for asbestos before demolition. Those include old flooring and its adhesive, joint compound and ceiling texture. Older houses covers what else the year a house was built decides.

Code in force

2018 North Carolina Residential Code. New work meets the rules for a new structure (Section R102.7.1).

Building permit

None on a single-family house, for work costing $40,000 or less and done to code. Load-bearing work, a new plumbing design, or new, replaced or changed wiring and appliances needs one at any cost (General Statute 160D-1110).

A load-bearing wall

A permit at any cost. The beam follows the plan, engineered where the plan calls for it (Section R301.1.3).

Alarms

Work under a building permit brings smoke alarms up to new-house placement. Carbon monoxide alarms follow where the house has a fuel-fired appliance, a fireplace or an attached garage (Sections R314.2.2 and R315.2).

So a kitchen plan that moves the sink, adds a circuit or replaces a built-in appliance needs a permit, whatever the job costs. New Hanover County's own permit guide lists a kitchen remodel as needing a building permit.

Under a raised house in a flood zone, any walled-in space below the flood height is kept to parking, building access and storage. So a new kitchen, and any bar with a sink, belongs on the raised floor, and the work counts toward the 50 percent rule.

The permit follows what moves.

Moving the sink changes the plumbing design, so it takes a plumbing permit. A new circuit or a moved outlet takes an electrical permit. A range hood system is mechanical work: New Hanover County lists it that way, and Brunswick County permits any venting system as mechanical. On its own, a new faucet or sink in the same spot, at the same size, fits the exemption. We list each trade the plan sets off before anything is priced.

A wall comes out once we know what it carries.

Want the wall between the kitchen and the living room gone? First we find out whether it carries weight from above. A wall that carries load comes out under a permit, whatever the job costs. A beam takes its place, sized to the plan and engineered where the plan calls for it. Pipes, wires and ducts inside the wall move with it, and each of those is permit work too.

Permitted work brings the alarms up to date.

When a kitchen job needs a building permit, the house gets smoke alarms placed as a new house would have them. That means one in each bedroom, one outside each sleeping area and one on each story. Work on the plumbing or the mechanical system alone is exempt. A building permit also brings carbon monoxide alarms, where the house has a fuel-fired appliance, a fireplace or an attached garage that opens into it.

A historic district looks at the outside.

In Southport's local historic district, any exterior work needs a certificate of appropriateness before the building permit. A new hood vent through an outside wall counts, and so does a moved window. In Wilmington, work you can see from the street in a local district goes to the Historic Preservation Commission first. Under state law, the layout inside is left to you, except in a landmark whose owner agreed to interior review. Older houses covers the districts in more detail.

A ducted hood sends its air outside.

A range hood that vents runs its air outdoors through a duct. The code wants that duct smooth inside and airtight, made of galvanized steel, stainless steel or copper. It carries a back-draft damper and serves the hood alone. It can never end in an attic, a crawl space or anywhere else inside the house. A listed ductless hood is allowed where the kitchen gets its fresh air another way, by a window or a fan.

Outside, the vent opening gets a corrosion-resistant screen, louver or grille, as every exhaust opening does under the code. On this coast, we also pick the cap for salt air. Coastal durability covers how we choose metal for salt air.

Makeup air for a strong hood

Every cubic foot of air a hood pulls out has to come back in from somewhere. A hood that can pull more than 400 cubic feet per minute (cfm) needs makeup air. That is fresh air brought in on purpose, at about the amount the hood pulls past 400. The system has a damper that closes, and it starts and runs whenever the hood does.

The line moves up to 600 cfm where every appliance in the house is direct-vent, power-vent, unvented or electric. The State Fire Marshal's office counts a listed gas range as unvented. A gas furnace or water heater that vents by natural draft keeps the line at 400, and so does a site-built masonry fireplace. Under the Fire Marshal's reading, a furnace or water heater sealed off from the house, taking all its air from outdoors, does not count. That is the point of the rule: a big hood can work against a flue that relies on natural draft. Two kitchen hoods in one house are added together.

Indoor air and airtightness without stuffy interiors cover how a tight house brings fresh air in on purpose.

Gas lines are tested before anything is lit.

Switching to gas, or moving a gas range, means new piping. The new branches are pressure tested, and their joints to the old pipe are leak-checked. Nothing is lit until the piping has been checked for leaks and purged, and its connections to the range checked. Under a raised house, the gas line runs in metal pipe, since the code keeps plastic gas pipe outdoors and underground. Switching to gas or to induction is permit work either way.

The sink can go in the island.

The code has a venting method made for a sink in an island. A kitchen sink with a dishwasher or a disposal qualifies. Moving the sink there is a change in the plumbing design, so it goes through a plumbing permit. Where the drain crosses floor joists, it stays inside the limits the code sets for holes and notches.

New lights meet the energy code.

New lighting that is part of the job meets the energy code. Most lamps in permanent fixtures have to be high-efficacy lamps, which the code defines by how much light they give per watt. A job that replaces fewer than half the fixtures in a room, without adding lighting power, is exempt.

A new window over the sink on the barrier islands needs protection from flying debris, like any glass there. Impact windows and doors covers what that takes.