Microwave: GE Cafe microwave – $349
This matches the range that we got – it’s about $100 more than we were looking to spend, but has some nice features, and looks great. We got it at the Sears Outlet, for about 50% of retail.
Dishwasher: Jenn-Air JDB1100AWS – $594
We spent a good deal of time trying to find a dishwasher that was better than our old one. The cheapest stainless steel dishwashers were roughly $330. Most of the really cheap ones were essentially our old dishwasher with a new front. That was a really… unsatisfying option.
Unfortunately, keeping our old appliances wasn’t an option (if I haven’t already written about that, it’s enough fodder for another post), so we had to find something new. This was a floor model from Fry’s, which we actually managed to negotiate the price down from the stated floor model price. This was, far and away, the cheapest stainless from/hidden control model we’d seen – the next closest was more than a hundred dollars more expensive. With a stainless “tub” on the interior, $150 more.
Refrigerator: Samsung RF265AASH – $1350
This was also bought at Fry’s – a return due to the customer not anticipating the proper size. Cosmetically, it’s more or less perfect, and has never been used. We got it for $150 cheaper than its normal price, which was nice. We’d looked for a good while for a French door fridge, and the next closest option was a Kenmore from the Sears Outlet for $1499, and we couldn’t find one that didn’t have something that didn’t have more than a minor blemish.
The Samsung is everything we wanted and nothing we didn’t (no self-closing doors, unfortunately, but the only model we saw with them was almost a thousand dollars more).
Range: GE Cafe slide-in – $1299
This was the best find of the last two weekends, by far. This is just about 50% less than the standard retail price, and though we got it from the Sears Outlet, it looks *perfect*. One of the biggest disappointments of the kitchen remodel has been the miscommunication that led to our stove and dishwasher being disposed of, instead of being kept.
Finding a range that has been a good combination of affordable, but *better* than the one that we used to have. This was difficult because our old stove was really great. It had a really good oven, a really nice high-powered burner, and proved to be really reliable and useful.
The only thing that was problematic with the old range we had (a GE, as well) was that the back console actually stuck out enough that it was difficult to put two tallish pans/pots front-to-back. As a result, when we started looking for a slide-in range (no back console), it was somewhat difficult to find something that really met the quality of our old range, was aesthetically pleasing, and a similiar, if not better value than our old one.
This thing, though… man. Feature-wise, it’s set to blow the doors off our old stove. It has four burners, one central griddle burner (and griddle), and two ovens. Our old stove had a power burner with (we think) 14,500 BTU. The new one has one 18,000 BTU burner, one 17,000 BTU, one 6.5K, and one 5K. The central is 9.5K, I believe. The oven is also a convection oven, which our old one was not.
We saw this at the Sears Outlet a couple weeks ago when we were looking for (what I remember as) $1,499. We thought, “Hey, this is a great stove,” but didn’t get it at that point. The next week, they were both sold, and we couldn’t find anything else that really hit the right notes. We went yesterday, and there was nothing. We went to the Sears Outlet in Milpitas, Fry’s, Best Buy, Sears, Airport Appliances… nothing. Nothing in the same value/feature range at all. We went back to the Sears Outlet in San Leandro, almost just because there wasn’t anything else to do. As we were there, they rolled out two pristine versions of this stove. Literally, I was standing in front of a blank space, and the woman at the store just rolled the range into the slot right in front of me. If there had been a spotlight and chorus accompanying her, it wouldn’t have made it any more dramatic in my mind.
Crazy.
So, that’s it – we’ve knocked down all the major appliances for our kitchen. My feet are tired, my legs hurt, I’m sick to death of looking at kitchen appliances, but we really got some good stuff for excellent prices.