Who makes the best low cost appliances?

[brian_riendeau]

Tomorrow I am closing on a new house and should be moving in over the next two weeks. The new house is coming with no appliances at all, I need to buy a washer, dryer, stove, and refrigerator. I am going to spend about $1600 to $1800 for everything, not including tax or delivery charges. I have been to Sears and Home Depot enough times to confuse myself. WHat brands should I be looking at?

Here is what I am currently thinking about, it is all Whirlpool, which could be a bad thing since I know so little about this stuff:

Washer:

http://www.sears.com/sr/javasr...ional+Top+Load+Washers

Dryer:

http://www.sears.com/sr/javasr...2000&subcat=Dryers

Stove (I would be getting a white version of this, description says black):

http://www.sears.com/sr/javasr...at=Freestanding+Ranges

We are also looking at some Maytag stuff at Home Depot. For a fridge, we are looking at top freezer models from Kenmore, Fridgidaire, Hotpoint (sucks?), and Whirlpool, and Maytag. Pretty much everything...

 

[Gibson486]

Originally posted by: brian_riendeau
Tomorrow I am closing on a new house and should be moving in over the next two weeks. The new house is coming with no appliances at all, I need to buy a washer, dryer, stove, and refrigerator. I am going to spend about $1600 to $1800 for everything, not including tax or delivery charges. I have been to Sears and Home Depot enough times to confuse myself. WHat brands should I be looking at?

Here is what I am currently thinking about, it is all Whirlpool, which could be a bad thing since I know so little about this stuff:

Washer:

http://www.sears.com/sr/javasr...ional+Top+Load+Washers

Dryer:

http://www.sears.com/sr/javasr...2000&subcat=Dryers

Stove (I would be getting a white version of this, description says black):

http://www.sears.com/sr/javasr...at=Freestanding+Ranges

We are also looking at some Maytag stuff at Home Depot. For a fridge, we are looking at top freezer models from Kenmore, Fridgidaire, Hotpoint (sucks?), and Whirlpool, and Maytag. Pretty much everything...

That's all good, but i would never buy anything at Home Depot though.....

 

[CPA]

Where you live, because I have a washer, dryer, stove and Frig for sale.

 

[richardycc]

hotpoint? think they are made by GE, and pretty much all rental owners buy that brand, so they must be cheap and ok reilablity wise?

 

[brian_riendeau]

Maine.

 

[Wingznut]

What about a Dishwasher?

 

[vi edit]

I've got hotpoint in my current home, and I've had it in rental property without any issues. It's a GE rebadge. Good stuff for cheap.

 

[Pliablemoose]

I know they're a bit more expensive, but we really like our front loader washing machine.

Front loader

 

[jadinolf]

I recently purchased a Frigidaire freezer and dish washer and the prices were great. I don't know what else they make but they are worth looking at.

Bought them at Lowes.

 

[Wingznut]

Originally posted by: Pliablemoose
I know they're a bit more expensive, but we really like our front loader washing machine.

Front loader

This washer > All top loader washers.

We picked up that washer last year, and it is sweet. I would really, REALLY recommend this one. Even if it means cutting the budget elsewhere. Oh yeah, and there's a matching dryer for ~$400.

 

[bozack]

I would say either GE or Whirlpool, really IMHO Whirlpool makes excellent appliances for low cost, especially their gold line...I just finished researching this as we were buying a new townhouse and went with all whirlpool, but ended up getting a slightly used townhouse which came with a majority of ge profile appliances...Kenmore and Hotpoint are both mostly GE rebadges as is Kitchenaid/Whirlpool...good luck

 

[Renob]

That's all good, but i would never buy anything at Home Depot though.....

Why

 

[Wingznut]

Originally posted by: Renob
That's all good, but i would never buy anything at Home Depot though.....

Why

I shop at HD all the time... I can't even count how much money I've spent there. Never had a bad experience.

 

[RossMAN]

I wouldn't touch any of that without at least a 10% off discount (15%+ is preferred).

 

[JetsFanatic]

I like sears

Just got a power washer and snow blower from them

 

[MisfitsFiend]

i hate sears...anything GE has been ok...

 

[dquan97]

There's a $10off coupon at Sears floating around.... I'm also shopping for a tv, under $1K. That sale on Samsung 47" at Amazon caught my eye.

 

[FrustratedUser]

Originally posted by: brian_riendeau
Tomorrow I am closing on a new house and should be moving in over the next two weeks. The new house is coming with no appliances at all, I need to buy a washer, dryer, stove, and refrigerator. I am going to spend about $1600 to $1800 for everything, not including tax or delivery charges. I have been to Sears and Home Depot enough times to confuse myself. WHat brands should I be looking at?

Here is what I am currently thinking about, it is all Whirlpool, which could be a bad thing since I know so little about this stuff:

Washer:

http://www.sears.com/sr/javasr...ional+Top+Load+Washers

Dryer:

http://www.sears.com/sr/javasr...2000&subcat=Dryers

Stove (I would be getting a white version of this, description says black):

http://www.sears.com/sr/javasr...at=Freestanding+Ranges

We are also looking at some Maytag stuff at Home Depot. For a fridge, we are looking at top freezer models from Kenmore, Fridgidaire, Hotpoint (sucks?), and Whirlpool, and Maytag. Pretty much everything...

Whirlpool makes great stuff.

 

[Pliablemoose]

Originally posted by: Wingznut

Originally posted by: Pliablemoose
I know they're a bit more expensive, but we really like our front loader washing machine.

Front loader

This washer > All top loader washers.

We picked up that washer last year, and it is sweet. I would really, REALLY recommend this one. Even if it means cutting the budget elsewhere. Oh yeah, and there's a matching dryer for ~$400.

Yep, we got the washer & matching dryer, & I plumbed in a gas line too, we can see a difference in our water consumption

Next step is an on demand gas water heater now that the major home improvement stores are carrying them

 

[RossMAN]

Wow front loaders have finally dropped in price.

Hopefully in a few years you can buy top of the line front loader pairs for $1,000 out the door.

 

[brian_riendeau]

Went shopping today with the wife and checkbook Our house has no appliances and we have some entertaining to do so it was important that we got everything delivered in a timely manner. We checked the stock status on everything we were interested in and made a list of what was ready to be delivered in less than 10 days. Took us about an hour to pickout the items. Well, once we started going through the (painful) checkout process, the stove was OOS and not availible for three weeks, and the washer and dryer could not be delivered for about a month. The sales woman was like, "Oops! I do not know what happened, I must have checked the wrong items when you asked. We can deliver everything together in three or four weeks." I replied with, "Go ask the manager what you can do for me since I just spent an hour picking out $2,000 worth of appliances you said were availible within 10 days."

She went away for a few minutes, and came back trying to get me to sign up for a Sears card and take floor model appliances. I went into my, "No, I do not want a Sears card" speech and smacked down the floor model, two of which were scratched anyway. She made another trip to the manager when it was obvious I was not going anywhere.

We ended up with three things under retail price:

Got this stove for $540:
http://www.sears.com/sr/javasr...at=Freestanding+Ranges

Washer for $400:
http://www.sears.com/sr/javasr...ional+Top+Load+Washers

Dryer for $370:
http://www.sears.com/sr/javasr...2000&subcat=Dryers

We paid regular price for the fridge. It is a Frigidaire rebadge and was a really good deal for an Energy Star fridge with an ice maker and split door shelves and split primary shelves:
http://www.sears.com/sr/javasr...+Freezer+Refrigerators

 

[randomlinh]

me likes kenmore stuff... plus, sears usually has some great promotions when you buy w/ their cards. either like 10% or some insanely long 0% APR deal.

 

[brian_riendeau]

The Sears card idea may have worked but I was not going to open up a new line of credit less than a week after buying a house. Besides, we spent a while saving up some cash for this stuff, we wanted to spend it

 

[flot]

Hmm, well sounds like I'm too late, but generally speaking - if you ever need a washer and dryer, there's no reason to buy them new.

I bought mine literally unused - list price was $950, best going price was $740, I picked up the pair (stackable, ironically the exact model I had been shopping for) for $450 from a newspaper ad. The seller even threw in the original receipt ($790) and the hose and power cord kit ($35).

That was a slightly unusual case, but it is very common to be able to pick up a nearly new washer and dryer set for 30-50% of their original cost. Why? Becuase there is no "standard" when it comes to buying/selling a house with these two appliances. Some people take theirs, some people leave theirs, some people buy a new place that has brand new appliances but want to keep their old fancy ones, some people don't want to move them... the list goes on and on, but basically NOBODY likes getting stuck with two sets of washers and dryers so they tend to be easy to find in the classifed ads.

The stove is a different case, it's a bit more unusual that the seller would take that with them.

 

[whoiswes]

Originally posted by: bozack
I would say either GE or Whirlpool, really IMHO Whirlpool makes excellent appliances for low cost, especially their gold line...I just finished researching this as we were buying a new townhouse and went with all whirlpool, but ended up getting a slightly used townhouse which came with a majority of ge profile appliances...Kenmore and Hotpoint are both mostly GE rebadges as is Kitchenaid/Whirlpool...good luck

I think you're wrong on the Kenmore comment - Kenmore is actually made by whirlpool. If you compare their products, most of the Whirlpool stuff has a Kenmore variant that is $50 cheaper and lacking one bell or whistle.

We have all Kenmore appliances. We've been pretty happy so far, and since we only paid $1100 for the washer, dryer, and fridge (mid-line stuff, not high end, but not bottom of the barrell either) and they have all performed well for us.

I also echo flot's sentiment about buying used - provided you can actually take a peek at the units and see what condition they're in, you can save a bundle and still end up with very nice appliances.