Kitchen & Bathroom Remodeling in Largo, FL
Serving ZIP Codes: 33770, 33771, 33773, 33774, 33778
Largo's Block Ranches Deserve a Straight Answer
We remodel kitchens and bathrooms across Largo from our Design Center in Pinellas Park, about ten minutes east on Ulmerton Road. Most Largo homes we work on are concrete-block ranches built between 1958 and 1979. They're solid houses with fifty-year-old kitchens, and they deserve better than a rushed refacing job.
Largo isn't a teardown market, and we don't treat it like one. Ridgecrest, Keene Park, and Del Prado are full of block ranches on slab foundations with eight-foot ceilings. The kitchens are usually galleys, walled off from the living room, with a fluorescent box light overhead. The bones are good. The layouts are from 1972.
A remodel here succeeds or fails on what happens before demo day. That means scoping the cast-iron drains under the slab, confirming which walls carry load, and checking the electrical panel. We build all of that into the design phase, then show you the finished room in photorealistic 3D before construction starts.
One licensed team handles design, permits through the City of Largo, and construction. You won't juggle a designer, a plumber, and a permit runner who've never met. And you won't get a one-day franchise wrap sold as a remodel.
What a 1970s Largo Ranch Kitchen Actually Needs
Start with the three problems nearly every original Largo kitchen shares: aging cast-iron drains, a closed galley layout, and bad light under a low ceiling. Solve those and the pretty parts get easy. Skip them and the pretty parts get expensive.
Scope the cast-iron drains before you order cabinets
Homes built here before the late 1970s usually drain through cast iron buried in the slab. That pipe has a service life of roughly 50 to 60 years, and the clock started in the Johnson administration. We camera-scope the lines during design, not after your new floors are down.
If the scope shows bellies or rot, a partial reroute typically runs $4,500 to $15,000 in 2026, depending on how far we trench. Finding out during design lets you decide with real numbers. Finding out after tile is installed means paying for the same floor twice.
Opening the galley wall
Your exterior walls are structural block, but the wall between the kitchen and living room is almost always wood-framed. Some of those partitions carry ceiling joists and some don't. We verify which one you have, size a beam where needed, and file the structural detail with the permit. Budget $3,000 to $9,000 for a typical opening, engineering included.
Lighting under an eight-foot ceiling
Most original Largo kitchens hide a fluorescent box behind a dropped soffit. Removing the soffit buys back visual height and clears room for full-height upper cabinets. We replace the box with low-profile LED wafers and under-cabinet strips, which put light on the counters instead of the floor. Pendants only make sense if we're adding a peninsula or island with clearance to spare.
One bonus we find often: original terrazzo hiding under carpet or vinyl. If it's intact, restoring it costs less than new flooring and handles Florida humidity better than laminate ever will.
Behind the Mud-Set Tile: Largo's Original Bathrooms
Original Largo bathrooms hide their age behind tile. The walls are often mud-set, a two-inch bed of concrete over metal lath, so demo takes real labor, not a pry bar. The tub is usually 300-plus pounds of cast iron. The supply lines may still be galvanized steel, narrowed by decades of corrosion. We plan for all three, so none of them becomes a change order.
Tub-to-shower conversions and aging in place
Plenty of Largo homeowners plan to stay in their ranch for the next twenty years. A tub-to-shower conversion swaps the unused cast-iron tub for a low-threshold shower. We add grab-bar blocking behind the wall whether you want bars yet or not. If mobility is the priority now, we also install walk-in tubs. A true curbless shower takes slab work in a slab-on-grade home, so it's a design decision, not an afterthought.
The ventilation the 1970s skipped
Many original Largo baths have no exhaust fan at all, just a jalousie window that stopped opening decades ago. In our humidity, that's how mold starts behind new paint. Every bathroom we remodel gets a properly ducted exhaust fan, vented outside, not into the attic.
Your Permit Goes to Largo City Hall: Usually
Largo runs its own permitting through the City of Largo Building Division at 201 Highland Avenue. Applications go through the Largo Civic Access Portal, the online system that replaced eTRAKiT. Plan review follows the Florida Building Code, 8th Edition (2023). We submit drawings, track review comments, and schedule inspections through the portal as your contractor of record, license CBC1268077.
Here's the local quirk: a Largo mailing address doesn't guarantee a Largo permit. Big unincorporated pockets carry Largo addresses but fall under Pinellas County Building Services instead. We confirm jurisdiction from the parcel record before we file anything, because filing in the wrong office costs you weeks.
What needs a permit? Moving plumbing, changing electrical circuits, removing any wall, replacing windows, and converting a tub to a shower all do. Swapping cabinets in the same footprint with no trade work generally doesn't. When it's borderline, we call the Building Division at (727) 586-7488 and get the answer in writing.
One more 2023-code reality: if the remodel replaces the kitchen window, the new unit must meet current wind-load requirements. Depending on your parcel's wind zone, that can mean impact glass or shutters. We price both routes during design so the permit doesn't stall on a spec sheet.
Honest Largo Numbers for 2026
These are real planning ranges from our current Pinellas work, not teaser prices. Your block ranch will land somewhere inside them based on scope, materials, and what demo uncovers.
Kitchen refresh with new cabinets, quartz counters, and backsplash in the same layout: $28,000 to $45,000 in 2026. Full kitchen remodel with a galley wall removed and plumbing relocated: $55,000 to $85,000. Hall bathroom taken down to the studs: $18,000 to $32,000. Primary bath with a curbless or low-threshold shower: $30,000 to $55,000. Tub-to-shower conversion: $12,000 to $22,000 installed. Walk-in tub: $10,000 to $18,000 installed.
Three things move those numbers in a Largo ranch. An under-slab drain reroute adds $4,500 to $15,000. A panel upgrade, common when original 100-amp service meets an induction range, runs $2,500 to $4,500. And on any home built before 1980, we recommend holding a 10 to 15 percent contingency. If you don't need it, you keep it.
Proof Nearby: A Kenneth City Block Home Like Yours
You shouldn't have to imagine what we'd do with a block ranch. In Kenneth City, about twelve minutes from east Largo, we opened a kitchen into the living room. It was exactly the kind of 1960s block home that fills Ridgecrest and Del Prado. Same slab, same low ceilings, same closed galley, and a completely different house when we finished.
On the bathroom side, our Gulfport project turned a cramped original master bath into a spa-style retreat. Mud-set demo, rerouted drains, curbless entry, all in south Pinellas block construction.
West Largo runs up against Belleair Bluffs and the beach corridor, and the housing shifts with it. Homes off Indian Rocks Road skew larger, and budgets stretch to match. The process doesn't change: same drain scope, same 3D design, same single permit file. We just spec finishes to fit the street.
Every project starts in our Design Center, where you'll see your own kitchen or bath rendered in photorealistic 3D. Cabinet doors, counter edges, how the light falls at 6 p.m. You approve the room before we order a single box. That's how we keep mid-market budgets honest: changes happen on a screen, where they're free.
Largo Questions We Answer Every Week
Do I need a permit to remodel a kitchen in Largo?
Yes, if the work touches plumbing, electrical, or walls, which almost every real kitchen remodel does. Applications go through the Largo Civic Access Portal. We file as the contractor, so you never touch the paperwork.
My mailing address says Largo. Is my permit city or county?
Not necessarily city. Large unincorporated pockets carry Largo addresses but permit through Pinellas County instead. We verify your parcel's jurisdiction on the county property record before filing, because the wrong queue wastes weeks.
How long does a full kitchen remodel take here?
Plan on two to three weeks of design, then permit review, then four to six weeks of construction for a typical kitchen. Bathrooms usually run three to five weeks of build time. Review time varies with the city's queue. We track it in the portal and schedule trades the day it clears.
Do my cast-iron drains have to be replaced?
Not automatically. If the camera scope shows sound pipe, we leave it alone and note the condition for your records. If it shows channeling or breaks under the new kitchen, replacing that run during the remodel is far cheaper than after.
What does a bathroom remodel cost in Largo in 2026?
Most of our Largo-area hall baths land between $18,000 and $32,000, and primary baths between $30,000 and $55,000. Mud-set tile walls and cast-iron tub removal are real labor items that cheaper quotes often lowball.
Can you remove the wall between my galley kitchen and living room?
Usually, yes. In a Largo block ranch that partition is wood-framed, not block. If it turns out to be load-bearing, a properly sized beam goes in, with the detail on your permit drawings.
Does the FEMA 50 percent rule affect my remodel?
Only if your home sits in a mapped flood zone, and most inland Largo blocks don't. Streets near McKay Creek can carry AE designations, though. There, your improvement value is measured against FEMA's substantial-improvement threshold. We check your flood panel before design begins, so the budget respects the rule from day one.
Visit the Design Center: Ulmerton East, Ten Minutes Out
The fastest way to get real answers is a visit. Bring photos, a rough sketch, or nothing but your address, and we can pull the parcel details while you're here. You'll leave knowing what your ranch needs, what it'll cost, and what it can look like.
TGA Kitchens & Remodeling Design Center, 3851 62nd Ave N, Suite A, Pinellas Park, FL 33781. From most of Largo, take Ulmerton Road east, head south on US 19, then turn east on 62nd Avenue North. Call (727) 800-4050 to set a time.
We're a Florida Certified Building Contractor, bonded and insured, with a 4.9-star rating across 110+ Google reviews. Your 1970s ranch has done fifty years of quiet service. Let's give it a kitchen and bath that'll do fifty more.