Building a Kitchen from Ikea As-Is

Shorter post as I literally could write pages on this topic!

Hubby and I bought a new house that had a functional, although ugly kitchen. We always had a dream to have an Ikea kitchen, and thanks to Christmas presents from our families were able to make that happen last year.

There are lots of ways to start with an Ikea kitchen, but we did with an in-Ikea appointment and room builder. Then came the fun of playing on the computers (home and Ikea) to tweak the designs to perfection.

Eventually we settled on a couple options that maximized space, took advantage of the Kitchen event promotion (get up to 20% of your purchase back in Ikea gift cards) and snuck in some new built-in appliances. We were super excited!

We put all of the items on order right near the end of the event, and then printed out the itemized list you get which became our “Bible” for the next month. Free shipping included (which was worth its weight in gold!)

Then cue the car-rides! We basically spent 3-4 times a week driving to Ikea to shop in the As-Is section. As people were buying kitchen items all the previous month, the returns to this section grew daily too! For us, this meant we could shop the already-built pieces against our checklist, buy them for 50-75% off, and return the same untouched piece still sitting in our living room for full price next trip! We made Ikea trips a ritual and honestly found 1-2 pieces every time we went. Over the course of a month, we found nearly half of our kitchen in the as-is section.. a considerable savings!

Some tips:

1. Double and triple check dimensions! Don’t trust the As-Is sticker label. Once bought, you own it!
2. Obviously, check for damage. In some cases we came across marker or marks on the outside, but if we were sandwiching that piece against another, the marks wouldn’t be seen
3. Door fronts and panel pieces are here too! We saved a boatload on frosted glass door fronts and the long fridge side panel that were silly expensive at full price.
4. Bring a big car. This sounds basic, but even we had some struggles with a SantaFe when we found some of the big cabinets at As-Is.
5. Sign up for the IKEA Family. If you have a Family card, IKEA will honor a past sale up to 90 days after.  This means you have 90 days after buying your kitchen to buy all those extra pieces you forgot about later.
6. Ask for free extra pieces when you’re returning the “new” pieces... We ended up needing more L brackets, screws and small bits while installing, which you can get for free from the Returns dept. 
7. Don’t just stop at the cabinets! We found our sink here in the as-is section because it was missing an “accessories” box. Well, we walked over to Returns and requested the exact box for free, which was delivered to our home a week later. Half price on a sink for.. no reason!
8. Ask the staff.. We became regulars for that month and bugged the people in the side/receiving room each visit if we could see cabinets that hadn’t yet been priced (we found two cabinets this way).
9. When returning the new item, they will ask if you got the Kitchen Event discount, and for how much, as they will take it off of the refund amount for each piece you bring back. If they don’t ask.. don’t tell! 
10. Taking a month to buy As-Is kitchen pieces mean you will need to have SPACE somewhere to store them all! We ended up with one room just for the as-is built pieces, and the whole living room for the “to be built/building” pieces.