Kitchen remodeling in Ocala, The Villages, and Wildwood
From cabinet and counter refreshes to full gut renovations with layout changes, we build kitchens that work for the way you actually cook and live. A licensed kitchen remodeling contractor serving Marion, Sumter, and Lake Counties, with permits pulled, inspections passed, and a written warranty on the work.
A kitchen remodel is a big check. Write it to a licensed contractor.
Your kitchen touches electrical, plumbing, and sometimes structural work all at once. That is exactly the kind of project where an unlicensed crew can leave you with problems that surface months later, and exactly where a licensed contractor earns the difference.
We handle the full scope: design decisions, demolition, cabinetry, countertops, tile, lighting, and the trades behind the walls. When permits are required, we pull them and pass the inspections. You get one contractor, one schedule, and one written warranty covering the workmanship for a full year.
Florida Legacy Construction is a state Certified Building Contractor, license CBC1268994. That is the license tier that covers structural work along with the plumbing, electrical, and mechanical trades under one roof, which matters on a kitchen more than on almost any other room in the house.
Kitchen remodel or kitchen renovation? The words matter less than the scope.
People use kitchen remodel, kitchen renovation, and kitchen remodeling to mean roughly the same thing, and we are not going to argue with anyone about vocabulary. What actually changes your budget and your timeline is not the word you use, it is whether the room stays where it is.
A kitchen renovation that keeps every appliance, sink, and wall in its current position is a finish job. New cabinets, new counters, new floor, new lighting. It moves fast, it needs less permitting, and it is the version most Ocala homeowners are picturing when they call.
The moment a wall comes out, a sink moves to an island, or the range wall changes, you are into a different project. Now there is plumbing to reroute, circuits to add, sometimes an engineered header to carry a load-bearing wall, and a permit and inspection sequence attached to all of it. Same room, roughly double the coordination.
Both are worth doing. They are just priced and scheduled differently, and knowing which one you are describing is the fastest way to get a real number instead of a guess.
Kitchen remodel cost in Ocala, 2026
Most contractors will not put a number on a page. Here are ours, based on what projects are actually costing in Marion County this year. Your real number comes from your real kitchen, but this is the honest starting point.
Refresh
Cabinet refacing or repainting, new countertops, sink and faucet, backsplash, lighting, paint. Same layout, same boxes.
Full Remodel
New semi-custom cabinets, quartz or granite counters, new flooring, full appliance package, updated fixtures. Layout stays put.
Custom Remodel
Layout changes, wall removal, island additions, custom cabinetry, relocated plumbing and electrical, premium appliances and finishes.
Want the full breakdown, including where every dollar goes and how 2026 cabinet tariffs are moving budgets? Read our 2026 kitchen remodel cost guide for Ocala or the cost guide for The Villages. Opening up the layout? See what load-bearing wall removal costs in Ocala.
What actually moves your number
Two kitchens the same size can land $25,000 apart. It is almost never the thing homeowners expect. Here is where the money really goes.
Cabinets
Typically 30% to 40% of the total. The jump from stock to semi-custom to full custom swings the budget more than any other single decision, and it is the one people underestimate most.
Whether anything moves
Relocating a sink, range, or refrigerator means new supply and drain lines, new circuits, and on a slab home, cutting and patching concrete. Keeping the layout is the cheapest decision available to you.
Countertop material
Laminate to quartz to natural stone is a real spread, and it scales with linear footage. A big island doubles the impact of the material you pick.
The age of the house
Older Marion County homes often need panel work, added circuits, or GFCI protection to bring the kitchen to current code. It is not optional and it is not always visible at the estimate stage until we open a wall.
Appliances
A builder-grade package and a professional-series package can differ by more than the cabinets cost. This is the easiest line to adjust if the total comes in high.
Structural changes
Removing a load-bearing wall adds engineering, an engineered header or beam, a permit, and inspections. Worth every dollar for the right floor plan, but it belongs in the budget from day one. In Marion County that runs $7,500 to $15,000 for a standard opening, though plenty of walls in block and truss homes turn out not to be load bearing at all.
Every part of a kitchen, under one contractor
A kitchen is a dozen trades stacked in one room. We self-perform or manage all of it, so you are not chasing five contractors and hoping their work lines up.
Kitchen wall removal
Open up the kitchen, dining, and living areas. Load-bearing walls get engineered headers and a permit, not a prayer. Opening up a closed-off kitchen usually means removing a load-bearing wall, which is structural work we're licensed to handle in-house, engineered, permitted, and inspected.
Kitchen islands
Prep space, seating, and storage in the middle of the room, with the plumbing and electrical run properly underneath.
Custom cabinetry
Stock, semi-custom, and full custom cabinet lines. Installed level, true, and shimmed to a floor that is never actually flat.
Countertops
Quartz, granite, and butcher block. Templated, fabricated, and set with seams where you will not stare at them.
Backsplash and tile
Tile laid out to land right at the corners, on substrate that is prepared instead of just covered up.
Roll-out storage
Pull-out shelves, drawer inserts, and pantry systems that make the cabinets you already paid for actually usable.
Bar tops
Raised or flush bar seating that gives the room a place for people to land while you cook.
Kitchen flooring
Tile, LVP, and hardwood, run correctly under or around cabinetry depending on what the install calls for.
Kitchen plumbing
Relocated sinks and drains, new supply lines, pot fillers, and disposal work by qualified trades, inspected when required.
Kitchen electrical
New circuits, GFCI protection, appliance runs, and outlets where the code and your coffee maker both want them.
Lighting
Recessed cans, pendants, and under-cabinet LED so you can actually see the cutting board.
Drywall and paint
Repair, finish, and paint that ties the new kitchen back into the rest of the house instead of stopping at the doorway.
How to choose a kitchen remodeling contractor in Ocala
You are going to get bids that differ by tens of thousands of dollars, and the cheapest one is rarely the cheapest one. Here is what to actually compare, whether or not you end up hiring us.
Verify the license yourself
Do not take a number off a truck door or a business card. Look it up on MyFloridaLicense.com. A kitchen with electrical and plumbing changes is licensed work in Florida, and a contractor who cannot pull a permit will ask you to pull it yourself, which puts the liability on you.
Ask who is actually on your job
Some companies sell the job with a designer and then hand it to whoever is available. Ask who runs the site day to day, who you call when something goes sideways, and whether the trades are the same crews every time.
Compare scopes, not totals
A bid that is $8,000 lower usually excludes something. Permits, electrical upgrades, flooring under the cabinets, disposal of the old kitchen, or the plumbing rework behind a moved sink. Line up the bids item by item before you compare the bottom line.
Get a fixed written price
Cost-plus and time-and-materials both have legitimate uses, but on a kitchen they mostly transfer risk to you. Ask for a fixed price after a real site visit, with allowances stated in writing for anything not yet selected.
Ask about insurance and the warranty
General liability and workers compensation, and a certificate you can actually see. Then ask what the workmanship warranty covers and for how long, in writing. Ours runs a full year on the work we perform.
Look at reviews with dates on them
Ten reviews from one week tells you less than steady reviews across two years. Read the middle ones, not just the five stars. You can see ours here.
Kitchen remodel permits in Marion, Sumter, and Lake Counties
Not every kitchen project needs a permit, and the ones that do are not complicated when someone who does this weekly handles the submittal. We pull the permits on our projects and coordinate the inspections.
Generally does not need a permit: replacing cabinets in the same location, new countertops, a new backsplash, flooring, painting, and swapping a faucet or a light fixture for one in the same spot.
Generally does need a permit: adding or relocating electrical circuits, moving plumbing supply or drain lines, changing a gas connection, altering structure such as removing a wall or enlarging an opening, and mechanical work like relocating a range hood duct.
The wrinkle in this market is jurisdiction. Which office reviews your project depends on your exact address, not your mailing city, and plenty of homes with an Ocala address sit in unincorporated Marion County. We confirm the right office before anything is submitted.
Marion County and Ocala
Homes in unincorporated Marion County are reviewed by the Marion County Building Safety department through its online permitting system. Addresses inside Ocala city limits go to City of Ocala Building Services instead.
The city publishes a target of roughly 10 business days for a first review on a complete submittal and about 5 business days on a resubmittal. Marion County does not publish a flat turnaround, so we do not quote one.
Sumter County and Wildwood
Sumter County reviews permits through its own online portal. The City of Wildwood runs a separate system for addresses inside city limits.
For homes in and around The Villages, the community's architectural review is a separate approval that runs parallel to the building permit, not instead of it. The Villages also crosses county boundaries, so jurisdiction gets confirmed address by address.
Lake County
Lake County accepts permit applications online or on paper, with zoning review happening before the building code review. The county does not review work inside incorporated cities, so a Leesburg address goes through the city's own building department.
Interior kitchen work rarely triggers impact fees, but anything that adds conditioned square footage can, and that gets confirmed during review rather than quoted up front.
What a kitchen remodel actually looks like, start to finish
No surprises is mostly a scheduling problem. Here is the sequence we run on every kitchen, so you know what week you are in and what happens next.
Free virtual estimate
Fifteen minutes from your phone. You walk us through the kitchen on video, tell us what you want changed, and we give you a realistic range before anyone drives out. No obligation and no salesperson in your living room.
Site visit and measure
If the range works for you, we come out, measure, look at the panel, check what is behind the walls where we can, and pin down the scope. This is where we find the things a video call cannot show, like an undersized panel or a wall that is carrying more than it looks like it is.
Fixed written price
You get an itemized proposal with a fixed price, not a range and not an hourly rate. Anything you have not selected yet is carried as a stated allowance so you can see exactly what changes if you upgrade the counters or the appliance package.
Selections and cabinet order
Cabinets drive the schedule, so this is the step that starts the clock. Once your layout and door style are approved and the order goes in, lead time runs in the background while we handle permitting.
Permits and demolition
We submit to the correct building department for your address and, once approved, protect the rest of the house and take the old kitchen out. Rough-in for plumbing and electrical follows, with inspections at the points the code requires.
Build, inspect, and punch out
Cabinets set, counters templated and installed, tile, flooring, lighting, paint, and appliances. Final inspection, then a walkthrough where you list anything you want corrected. The one-year workmanship warranty starts when the job is done, not when the contract is signed.
Hire licensed. It matters on this job.
Kitchen remodels regularly involve electrical and plumbing changes that Florida law says belong in licensed hands. Verify license CBC1268994 on MyFloridaLicense.com before hiring anyone, including us.
Kitchen remodeling across Central Florida
Our shop is in Ocala and we work a tight radius on purpose. Every kitchen renovation we take is close enough that the crew is on site early and the owner can be there the same day if something needs a decision.
Ocala kitchen remodeling
Marion County is home. We know the permitting office, and we know what tends to be behind the walls of a 1970s Silver Springs Shores ranch, a downtown historic-district home, and the newer builds spreading across southwest Ocala. Each one hands you a different surprise once the drywall comes off.
Older Ocala homes are the ones most likely to need panel or circuit work to bring a kitchen to current code. We look at that during the site visit rather than discovering it during demo.
Ocala services →The Villages kitchen remodeling
Concrete block and stucco, slab construction, tight architectural review expectations, and homeowners who want the job done cleanly and on schedule. Kitchen renovations in The Villages are everyday work for us.
Two things shape almost every Villages kitchen: the community approval process runs alongside the building permit, and moving a sink on a slab means cutting concrete. Both are workable. Both belong in the plan from the start.
The Villages services →Wildwood kitchen remodeling
A short run up US-301 from the shop. Wildwood is growing fast, and we remodel kitchens there in both established homes and newer construction, which are genuinely different jobs.
Newer builds usually need layout work more than systems work, since the wiring and plumbing are current. Older Wildwood homes are the opposite. We price them differently because they are different.
Wildwood services →Also serving Marion, Sumter, and Lake Counties
Belleview, Summerfield, Lady Lake, Leesburg, and Dunnellon are all inside our normal working radius, along with the surrounding communities in all three counties. If you are searching for a kitchen remodeling contractor near you and you are within about an hour of Ocala, call and ask. If we are not the right fit for your project, we will say so.
Common questions
How much does a kitchen remodel cost in Ocala?
Most full kitchen remodels in Ocala run $28,000 to $60,000. A refresh runs $12,000 to $28,000, and a custom remodel with layout changes runs $60,000 to $120,000 or more. Our 2026 cost guide breaks down exactly where the money goes.
How long does a kitchen remodel take?
A refresh runs two to four weeks of construction. A full remodel is typically six to ten weeks, and a custom project with layout changes can run ten to fourteen weeks. Cabinet lead time happens before any of that, so the schedule starts the day you approve the order.
Do I need a permit to remodel my kitchen?
It depends on the scope. Replacing cabinets in the same location, new countertops, backsplash, flooring, and paint generally do not require a permit. Adding or relocating electrical circuits, moving plumbing, changing a gas connection, or altering structure typically does. We tell you up front what your project requires and handle the paperwork when it does.
Which building department handles my kitchen permit?
It depends on your exact address rather than your mailing city. Homes inside Ocala city limits go through City of Ocala Building Services, and homes in unincorporated Marion County go through Marion County Building Safety. Sumter County and the City of Wildwood run their own systems, and Lake County does not review work inside incorporated cities such as Leesburg. We confirm the correct office before submitting anything.
Can I stay in my home during the remodel?
Almost always yes. We contain the work area and keep a functioning path through the home. Many clients set up a temporary kitchen station in another room.
What drives the price the most?
Cabinets, by a wide margin. They typically run 30% to 40% of the total budget, and the jump from stock to semi-custom to full custom swings the number more than any other single decision you will make. After cabinets, the biggest lever is whether the sink, range, or refrigerator moves.
What is the difference between a kitchen remodel and a kitchen renovation?
In practice the terms are used interchangeably. What actually changes the budget and the schedule is whether the layout stays put. Keeping every appliance, sink, and wall where it is makes the project a finish job. Moving a sink to an island or taking out a wall adds plumbing, electrical, permitting, and sometimes structural work.
Can you remove a wall to open up my kitchen?
Yes. Opening a closed-off kitchen usually means removing a load-bearing wall, which requires an engineered header or beam, a permit, and inspections. We are a Certified Building Contractor, so that structural work is handled in-house rather than subcontracted out. Worth knowing: many interior walls in Marion County and The Villages homes are not load bearing at all, because the roof trusses span exterior wall to exterior wall. See our load-bearing wall removal cost guide.
How do I choose a kitchen remodeling contractor in Ocala?
Verify the license yourself on MyFloridaLicense.com rather than trusting a number on a business card. Ask who runs your job day to day. Compare bids scope by scope instead of comparing bottom lines, since a cheaper bid usually excludes something. Ask for a fixed written price with stated allowances, confirm general liability and workers compensation coverage, and read reviews that are spread across years rather than clustered in one week.
Do you offer financing for a kitchen remodel?
We work with lending partners rather than lending money ourselves, so there is no markup from us on what you borrow. Remodeling financing, home equity options, and VA loan routes all fit different situations, and our financing pages lay out which tends to suit which project size.
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