2026 local estimate · updated 2026-07-22
Cost to remodel a kitchen in St. Louis, MO
A typical kitchen remodel in the St. Louis, MO-IL area runs $72,230, with most projects landing between $10,319 and $134,141 — about 3% above the national average.
Low
$10,319
Basic materials, simple job
Typical
$72,230
What most people pay
High
$134,141
Premium materials or complex job
What's priced: Mid-range remodel of a typical kitchen — new cabinets, countertops, sink and fixtures — without moving walls or relocating plumbing. Excludes permits, structural repairs found mid-job, and premium upgrades.
Why St. Louis is more expensive than average
Almost entirely labor. Carpenters in the St. Louis, MO-IL area earn about 9% more than the national mean for the same occupation, per Bureau of Labor Statistics wage data. Because kitchen remodel is roughly 35% labor, that difference flows straight into the total.
Cabinets and countertops are the largest line items in a kitchen remodel and are bought rather than built on site, so materials carry most of the cost. Labor share rises on gut renovations that move plumbing or electrical, and falls on cabinet-and-counter refreshes.
Get a number for your own job
The figures above are for a standard project. Your size, materials, and access will move them. Run your own specification through the calculator, then apply the ×1.091 local labor factor to the labor portion.
Open the kitchen remodel calculator →Permits for a kitchen remodel in St. Louis
Issuing authority: City of St. Louis Building Division – Permit Section
St. Louis prices a building permit over $3,000.00 in estimated construction cost at $25.00 plus $10.00 per thousand of that cost; lower jobs fall into set bands instead, such as $0 to $1,000.00 running $25.00 plus $19.00 for a $44.00 total. Because the building permit may also require separate plumbing, mechanical and electrical permits pulled by the appropriate licensed contractor for each trade, those carry their own charges on top of the building permit.
A plumbing permit carries a $30 application fee plus $10 for each fixture — things like a floor drain, water heater or backflow device — and an electrical permit application is a flat $25.00 on its own. The schedule also lists a rough inspection and a finish inspection at $25.00 each, so a remodel with both plumbing and electrical trades involved is paying several of these fees at once rather than one combined charge.
When a permit is needed
- “Building permits may also require a separate plumbing, mechanical, and electrical permit. The appropriate licensed contractor from the Section that reviews, issues, and performs the inspection of this work must apply for these.” — City of St. Louis Building Division, Additional Permits | City of St. Louis (retrieved 2026-09-23)
Fees
- “Over $3,000.00 estimated construction cost or fraction thereof $25.00 $10.00 per thousand estimated construction cost or fraction thereof” — City of St. Louis Building Division, Apply for a Building Permit | City of St. Louis (retrieved 2026-09-23)
- “$0 - $1,000.00 $25.00 $19.00 $44.00 $1,001- $2,000.00 $25.00 $23.00 $48.00 $2,001 - $3,000.00 $25.00 $30.00 $55.00” — City of St. Louis Building Division, Apply for a Building Permit | City of St. Louis (retrieved 2026-09-23)
- “Fees for Plumbing Permits Type Fee Surcharge Application Fee $30 ... Fixtures, each (floor drain, sump, water heater, reduced pressure backflow device or double gate/double check valve, roof drain or trapped outlet) $10” — City of St. Louis Building Division, Plumbing Permit Fees | City of St. Louis (retrieved 2026-09-23)
- “Rough inspection, each $25 Finish inspection, each $25” — City of St. Louis Building Division, Plumbing Permit Fees | City of St. Louis (retrieved 2026-09-23)
- “The application fee for all electrical permits is $25.” — City of St. Louis Building Division, Electrical Permits | City of St. Louis (retrieved 2026-09-23)
Quoted verbatim; not recalculated.
Also covers Wentzville, Town and Country, St. Louis County
St. Charles County and St. Louis County are both inside the St. Louis, MO-IL metropolitan area that BLS prices, so the labor figures on this page apply across them. There is no separate St. Louis suburb estimate to look up: those communities are priced by the same carpenters wage data as the figures above, so a kitchen remodel there typically runs $72,230, with most projects between $10,319 and $134,141.
Metropolitan-area membership follows the area definitions BLS publishes its OEWS metro estimates against — May 2025 reference period. What genuinely varies inside a metro is the individual property, not the labor market: roof pitch, access, and how much has to come off before anything goes on. Price your own job.
Nearby metros
- Kitchen remodel in Kansas City, MO — typically $70,686
- Kitchen remodel in Bakersfield, CA — typically $72,156
- Kitchen remodel in Fresno, CA — typically $72,009
Compare kitchen remodel cost across every US metro we cover — the same labor-adjusted model as this page, ranked from most to least expensive, if you want the national picture rather than St. Louis alone.
How we calculate this
We take a national installed-cost range, split it into labor and materials, and scale only the labor half by this metro's actual wage data. That is the whole model — no black box, and reproducible from the figures on this page.
- National range: $10,000–$130,000, from our kitchen remodel cost data (last verified 2026-07-13).
- Labor share: 35%. An industry rule of thumb, not a measured value — the softest assumption here, which is why we state it rather than bury it.
- Metro labor factor: ×1.091, being the mean annual wage for Carpenters in St. Louis, MO-IL divided by the national mean for the same occupation.
- Materials: held at the national level. We vary labor by metro and hold materials at the national level. That is deliberate: shingles, copper, HVAC equipment, and cabinets are nationally traded and priced, and what actually varies locally is freight and sales tax — both small next to the labor spread. We have no metro-level materials index we can defend, so rather than invent one, we vary only what we can source.
Wage source: U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics — Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics (OEWS), metropolitan area estimates, May 2025. A U.S. Government work, in the public domain and free to reuse. Where BLS suppresses wage data for a metro, we publish no page for it rather than fill the gap with an estimate.
Educational estimate only. A real quote for your specific property beats any model, including ours — get at least three.
Related
Frequently asked questions
How much does it cost to remodel a kitchen in St. Louis, MO?+
A typical project in the St. Louis, MO-IL area runs about $72,230, with most falling between $10,319 and $134,141. Of the typical figure, roughly $26,730 is labor and $45,500 is materials. That puts St. Louis about 3% above the national typical cost of $70,000.
Why is it more expensive to remodel a kitchen in St. Louis, MO than the national average?+
Almost entirely labor. Carpenters in the St. Louis, MO-IL area earn about 9% more than the national average for the same occupation, according to Bureau of Labor Statistics wage data. Because kitchen remodel is roughly 35% labor, that wage difference flows through to the total. Materials are priced nationally and barely move between metros.
What's included in these St. Louis, MO estimates?+
Installed cost — materials plus labor for a standard project of this type. It does not include permits, which vary by municipality, structural repairs discovered mid-job, or premium upgrades. The range reflects genuine variation in scope and material grade, not uncertainty about the metro. Always get at least three local quotes before budgeting; a real quote for your specific property will beat any estimate, including ours.
How is this different from a national average with the city name swapped in?+
We split the national installed cost into labor and materials, then scale only the labor half using the actual mean wage for Carpenters in this specific metro area, published by the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Materials stay at the national level because we have no defensible metro-level materials index — shingles and HVAC equipment are nationally traded, and only freight and sales tax really vary. Where BLS suppresses wage data for a metro, we do not publish a page for it at all rather than fill the gap with a guess.