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Dear All:

I am hoping to gain some valuable advice from those out there who have gone through kitchen and general renovations. I am about to embark on my third (and hopefully last) phase renovation in my brownstone home. In this phase I am going to renovate my kitchen and a guest room to accommodate our daughter who is quickly growing out of her small nursery room. The bids that I have received so far from both an electrician and contractor seem a bit high; granted the last renovation I did was in 2004 and I did not do a kitchen renovation at anytime. I want to ask those who have been through all of this before and fairly recently if they feel the numbers add up. Here are the figures I have gotten to date:

Electrical work: $18,000(this includes re-wiring kitchen, installing 4 high hats in ceiling, new plugs, dimmers, under the counter lighting), re-wiring bedroom (this includes on center ceiling light fixture and new plugs), and some re-wiring in a back livingroom area to accommodate and mount new flat screen TV).

Contractor bid: $37,000

This includes preparing the kitchen for new cabinets, renovating new bedroom (new dry wall, new windows, new closet construction, painting).

I realize that not all details have been included, but that is the job in a nutshell. Any advice that can be afforded would be greatly appreciated. Thanks to all in advance.