Kitchen remodeling
Bathroom remodeling
Home additions & ADU
Roofing
Windows & doors
Driveway & pavers
FenceFree written scope consultation - allowances, timeline, and change-order rules on paper before a single trade is scheduled
Fast, Reliable Home Remodeling Across Highland
Home remodeling in Highland usually costs between $9,000 for a small bathroom and $130,000 for a full addition, and the single biggest variable is what’s hiding behind the walls of older homes near Baseline and Victoria. We’re Elmwood Contractors, a single-source general contractor led by Nolan Shepherd, and we’ve rebuilt enough Highland houses to know that a flat-lot tract home off the 210 and a foothill parcel up toward the Crafton Hills can produce completely different scopes once the drywall comes down. Our team coordinates every trade under one roof, from framing to finish carpentry, and we name the brands going into your home before the contract is signed. Call (866) 253-8554 for a free estimate with a line-item scope written for your specific street, not a generic spreadsheet.
Why Elmwood Contractors Is Highland’s Preferred Home Remodeling Company
Home Remodeling in Highland means working across two very different building generations within a few blocks. The mid-century tract homes from the postwar years, especially in the flat subdivisions west of the 210, carry outdated electrical panels, original plumbing, and framing that predates current shear-wall requirements. The newer east-side development has its own issues: production-grade finishes, undersized water heaters, and exterior details that don’t hold up to triple-digit Inland Empire summers. We know where each problem lives because we’ve opened walls in both.
Nolan Shepherd and our crews work the 92346 zip code regularly. We pull permits through the City of Highland and coordinate inspections without making you chase paperwork. Highland homeowners hire us because we give them a written scope with allowances for exactly the things that typically surface in local houses: cloth-wrapped wiring, failed supply lines, dry-rotted subfloor under older kitchens. You’ll see those line items before we start, not after the wall is open.
Styles & brands we work with
Whole House Remodel in Highland
A Whole House Remodel in Highland typically runs $45,000 to $130,000 depending on square footage, the age of the existing systems, and whether the lot is flat valley floor or graded foothill pad. What a whole-house job actually involves here is less about paint and fixtures and more about bringing a 1960s or 1970s house up to current code: panel upgrades, structural shear, insulation, and waterproofing that the original builder never installed. Most Highland homeowners reach for a whole-house remodel when they’re already facing a roof replacement or a failing electrical system and decide to address everything at once instead of chasing repairs room by room.
What gets replaced first
We sequence the work so the ugly, expensive things happen while walls are open. Electrical rough-in, plumbing repipe, and HVAC ducting go in before insulation and drywall. That order matters more in Highland than in coastal cities because our dry heat cycle stresses wiring and duct seals differently; a panel that’s been cooking in an unconditioned garage since the Johnson administration is usually at the end of its service life regardless of the remodel scope.
Where the budget actually goes
Line items that surprise first-time remodelers are the ones that never show up on television: shear wall retrofits, seismic hold-downs, drainage corrections on graded pads, and the cost of bringing a 100-amp panel to 200 amps. We write these into the quote as named allowances, not vague contingencies. When we open a wall and find the cloth-wrapped wiring we expected, the repair price is already on the page.
Luxury Home Remodeling in Highland
Luxury Home Remodeling in Highland isn’t about gold faucets; it’s about choosing materials and systems that survive the heat, the Santa Ana wind season, and the short but hard winter rain window without failing in five years. A luxury kitchen remodel here typically starts around $45,000 and climbs based on countertop material, cabinet line, and structural changes. We’ve installed KraftMaid and Wellborn cabinetry, Cambria and Silestone countertops, and plumbing fixtures from Kohler, Moen, and Toto in Highland homes on Victoria, Baseline, and up the graded streets toward the foothills, and we offer dedicated Highland Kohler service for fixture selection and installation.
Materials that earn their cost locally
In Highland’s climate, the right countertop is dictated by UV exposure and thermal cycling, not just looks. Engineered stone like Cambria and Silestone handles temperature swings without the cracking risk some natural stones carry. For exterior-adjacent remodels, James Hardie siding and PGT impact-rated windows are on our short list because both are engineered for heat and wind conditions that replicate exactly what Highland dishes out August through October.
What sets a Highland luxury job apart
The separation between a standard remodel and a luxury job often comes down to what’s invisible: Schluter waterproofing under tile, acoustic separation in interior walls, dedicated circuits for appliance banks. We price these as named upgrades so you see exactly what you’re paying for and why. A high-end kitchen on a sloped lot near the Crafton Hills also usually needs drainage and retaining corrections underneath the addition, and we fold those into the same scope rather than handing you a separate invoice from a landscaping sub.
Trusted Brands We Service in Highland
We service and install a defined roster of brands across every trade, and we’re direct with Highland customers about which ones we’ll put in their house and why. For cabinetry, KraftMaid and Wellborn cover two very different price points with consistent fit and finish. For countertops, Cambria, Silestone, and Caesarstone give you three tiers of engineered stone with different warranty structures and color stability. James Hardie siding holds up to highland sun and wind better than most vinyl products, and Plant Prefab gives us an ADU option that ships as a manufactured system rather than a stick-built gamble. We keep local inventory relationships that speed up ordering for the 92346 area, and we don’t stock brands that fail here.
See the difference
Before
After
Before
After
Before
AfterCommon Home Remodeling Problems We See in Highland Homes
- Undersized electrical panels with cloth-wrapped branch wiring. Homes built before roughly 1980 in Highland’s older tracts often still carry original panels with no capacity left for a modern kitchen or bath. The moment you pull a permit, you’re looking at a panel upgrade; we write that into the estimate from the start.
- Foothill grading and drainage failures behind finished walls. Properties on graded pads up toward the Crafton Hills hide retaining and waterproofing conditions that flat-lot homes a few streets down never see. We’ve opened bathroom walls on foothill streets and found soil moisture wicking into framing that looked fine from the outside.
- Dry-rotted subfloor under kitchens and bathrooms. Slow supply-line leaks in older Highland homes can soften a subfloor for years before anyone notices. The fix is structural, not cosmetic, and it changes the schedule and the number.
- Permit-triggered code upgrades left out of the verbal quote. Highland’s inspection requirements force electrical, framing, and waterproofing upgrades once walls are open. Contractors who don’t put those in writing before demo leave homeowners with a surprise at sign-off. We don’t work that way.
Pricing for Home Remodeling in Highland, CA
Here are the real numbers for Home Remodeling in Highland, based on what we’ve actually bid and built in the 92346 area over the last several years:
| Project | Typical Range (Highland, CA) |
|---|---|
| Kitchen Remodel | $14,000 – $45,000 |
| Bathroom Remodel | $9,000 – $28,000 |
| Home Addition | $45,000 – $130,000 |
| Cabinet Installation | $4,000 – $13,000 |
| Countertop Installation | $2,000 – $6,500 |
What moves the number is almost always what the walls reveal: panel capacity, framing condition, subfloor integrity, and waterproofing on sloped lots. A flat-tract kitchen off Baseline might hit $18,000 all in. The same footprint on a graded foothill pad with drainage correction underneath could land at $32,000. Both are honest numbers. We just write both scenarios into the allowances before you sign. Call (866) 253-8554 and we’ll walk your specific house and street before quoting anything.
On a mid-century tract home off the flat valley floor near the 210, our crew opened a kitchen wall expecting a simple pass-through. What we found was cloth-wrapped wiring feeding a panel with no capacity left, plus a subfloor softened by a slow supply-line leak. We stopped, wrote the electrical and subfloor repair into a signed change order before any drywall went back up, and finished the KraftMaid cabinet rough-in on a revised draw schedule. The homeowner saw the number in writing before we touched it. No surprises at the punch list.
We Also Serve Cities Near Highland
Elmwood Contractors runs crews into San Bernardino, Muscoy, Redlands, and Loma Linda on a regular schedule. If you’re just outside the 92346 boundary and planning a kitchen, bath, or whole-house job, the same Highland pricing and process applies. Call (866) 253-8554 and we’ll confirm coverage for your street before we schedule the walkthrough.
Serving Highland, CA — Our Local Coverage Area
We’re based in the Highland area and know this community well. Use the map below to see our service coverage — if you’re nearby, we can almost certainly help.
FAQs About Home Remodeling in Highland
Because older Highland homes, especially the postwar tract stock, hide outdated panels, undersized framing, and failed waterproofing behind finished surfaces that no amount of pre-bid walking can fully reveal. Our quotes include named allowances for these conditions, so when we open the wall and find what we expected, the repair price is already approved in writing, and anything beyond the allowance gets a signed change order before we proceed. Call (866) 253-8554 for a quote that anticipates what your house is hiding.
Yes, most structural, electrical, plumbing, and waterproofing work in Highland requires permits through the city, and those permits trigger code upgrades the original house never had to meet. Electrical service, shear wall, and insulation requirements are the big three. We pull permits, schedule inspections, and write the upgrade costs into the contract so they’re not a surprise at final sign-off.
Yes, noticeably. Homes on graded pads up toward the Crafton Hills routinely have drainage and retaining conditions that flat subdivision lots a few streets down never see, and opening a wall or adding square footage can expose footing and waterproofing corrections the scope didn’t originally include. We bid foothill remodels differently from valley-floor remodels, with allowances for exactly those corrections. Call (866) 253-8554 and tell us your street; the answer changes block by block.
We install KraftMaid and Wellborn cabinetry, Cambria, Silestone, and Caesarstone countertops, and Kohler, Moen, Toto, and Grohe plumbing fixtures, matched to your budget and the specific demands of a Highland house. For exterior-adjacent work, James Hardie siding and PGT windows are on our standard list. You’ll see the exact brand names in the contract before you sign.
We structure draws by completed phase, not by calendar date, and every phase is backed by a written scope with named allowances. That means you’re paying for finished work products you can walk through with us, not a promise. Any surprise gets a signed change order before work continues, so the budget never moves without your signature. Estimates are free at (866) 253-8554.
Written by Nolan Shepherd, Owner at Elmwood Contractors, serving Highland and the Inland Empire since our first foothill remodel.