Kitchen Remodeling in Woodland Hills

Green Design and Build is a licensed general contractor (CSLB #1110975) based at 16120 Sherman Way in Van Nuys, a straight run west along Sherman Way or the 101 to Woodland Hills. We build kitchens here as a design-build contractor — drawings, engineering, permit and construction under one contract.

A Woodland Hills kitchen remodel typically runs $25,000 to $40,000 for a cosmetic refresh, $40,000 to $70,000 for a mid-range remodel and $70,000 to $100,000 or more for a full remodel with layout changes, and a kitchen that keeps its walls is an LADBS Express Permit with no plan check. Below: a Woodland Hills house where the kitchen was part of a full rebuild, what the City of Los Angeles requires to permit kitchen work, and what it costs.

A Woodland Hills kitchen, inside a whole-home rebuild

This was not a kitchen job that stayed a kitchen job. Once the finishes came off, very little of the existing structure was worth keeping. A few walls stayed; interior partitions, ceilings, the rear elevation and the mechanical systems all came out, and the house was rebuilt around what remained — new foundations, framing, roof, exterior, full interior including the kitchen and bathrooms, plus the pool, a covered patio, a block retaining wall and the pool deck.

The whole sequence is documented here: Whole-home rebuild in Woodland Hills.

It is a useful project to look at even if you only want a kitchen, because it shows the decision every older Valley house eventually forces: how much of what is behind the drywall is worth keeping. That call is better made early and deliberately than discovered in week three.

Permits for a Woodland Hills kitchen, and what the house adds to them

Woodland Hills is inside the City of Los Angeles, so the permit comes from the Department of Building and Safety (LADBS) rather than the County, and the Valley counter is the Development Services Center at 6262 Van Nuys Blvd, 2nd Floor, Room 251. That is the same LADBS office that serves our home base at 16120 Sherman Way, about 20 minutes east of Woodland Hills by the 101 or Ventura Boulevard, and we prepare and submit the application, respond to corrections and schedule every inspection. The counter is open 7:30am to 4:30pm Monday, Tuesday, Thursday and Friday and 9:00am to 4:30pm Wednesday, and stops issuing tickets at 4pm.

The city rules, in short

Los Angeles exempts “cases, counters and partitions, not over 5 feet 9 inches high” from the building permit (LAMC section 91.106.2), so a true like-for-like cabinet and counter swap in the same layout needs no building permit. Electrical, plumbing, mechanical and gas work are permitted separately, so as soon as a circuit moves, an outlet is added or the sink or range relocates, the kitchen needs a permit, and in practice most kitchen remodels do. The code sections and the Express Permit rules are set out in our guide to kitchen remodel permits in Los Angeles; what follows is the part that matters for a Woodland Hills house.

What is specific to Woodland Hills is the house, not the rulebook. The single-family streets on the flats between Ventura Boulevard and Victory Boulevard are 1950s and 1960s ranch houses, with the usual findings behind the drywall: galvanized supply lines, a 100-amp panel and original single-pane aluminum windows. The hills above the boulevard are 1950s to 1970s ranches and later custom homes. Each of those findings turns a cosmetic kitchen into a permitted one, because new supply lines are plumbing work, a larger panel is an electrical service upgrade, and any window replaced at the same size is an Express item that has to be NFRC-labeled dual glazing under Title 24. In the hills south of the boulevard an interior kitchen follows the same permit path as anywhere else in the city; it is additions and new structures that bring in the Baseline Hillside Ordinance and the fire-zone construction rules.

Express Permit or plan check: which one your kitchen is

LADBS lists “kitchen/bathroom remodel for residential buildings (no structural changes)” as an Express Permit item, so a kitchen that keeps its walls where they are is permitted over the counter with no plan check. In Woodland Hills that is often not the kitchen we are asked for. The post-war ranch kitchens here were built as closed rooms, and the usual request is to open one to the family room and the yard, which typically means a beam and new electrical.

Once a wall comes out or an opening is enlarged the job goes to plan check, with a beam, posts and an engineer behind it. That is slower than an Express Permit but not necessarily slow: simple residential alterations can go through Counter Plan Check, where “the plans are reviewed the same day as plan submittal”. Which path your kitchen is on gets settled at the site visit, before anything is drawn, because it changes the schedule as much as the budget.

The gas valve, the panel and the heat

The city also requires an earthquake-actuated gas shutoff valve when a residential alteration is “valued at more than $10,000”, and a Woodland Hills kitchen that moves the range, replaces the panel or opens a wall clears that threshold easily. Budget for the valve as part of the job; it is a small line item next to the rest of the work.

The panel is the item that most often sets the sequence; a 100 to 200 amp upgrade for an overhead service runs about $4,000 to $8,000. Heat is the other Woodland Hills specific: the neighborhood regularly records the highest temperatures in the City of Los Angeles, so any kitchen window we replace goes to low-E glass, with particular attention to a west-facing wall.

Rules change. We confirm the current LADBS requirements for your address on every job as part of the site visit, before you commit to a scope.

What a kitchen costs in Woodland Hills

We publish three working tiers for a Los Angeles kitchen. They hold in Woodland Hills as well as anywhere else in the Valley — what moves the number is the size of the room, whether walls move, and the finishes.

These are typical Los Angeles budgeting estimates, not a price list or a quote. Your project can come in lower or higher depending on the house, the scope and the finishes; the only real number is a written proposal after a site visit.

The detail behind those tiers — where the money actually goes, and what pushes a kitchen from one tier to the next — is in our Los Angeles kitchen remodel cost guide.

When a kitchen turns into something larger

Woodland Hills has a lot of houses from the post-war tract era, and in our experience the kitchens in them share a problem: they were built as closed rooms, separated from everything else, with electrical that was never designed for two ovens and an induction cooktop.

That means a Woodland Hills kitchen remodel often runs into three things at once — a wall someone wants removed, a panel that will not carry the new load, and plumbing that has to move. None of those is a reason not to do the work. All three are reasons to find out what you have before you sign a contract, which is what the site visit is for.

If the panel needs upgrading, note that LADWP requires a meter spot sheet from an Electric Service Representative before Building and Safety inspects a residential service of 400 amps or less. That is a sequencing item, not an obstacle, but it is one that adds time if nobody starts it early.

Questions we get asked

Do I need a permit for a kitchen remodel in Woodland Hills?

Los Angeles exempts “cases, counters and partitions, not over 5 feet 9 inches high” from the building permit, so a genuine like-for-like cabinet and counter swap does not need one. Any electrical, plumbing, mechanical or gas work is permitted separately, and LADBS requires an electrical permit for any electrical work. In practice most kitchen remodels need a permit.

Does my kitchen have to go through plan check?

Not if the walls stay put. LADBS lists a residential kitchen remodel with no structural changes as an Express Permit item, which skips plan check entirely. Remove a wall and it goes to plan check, though simple residential alterations can be reviewed the same day through Counter Plan Check.

Do I need a seismic gas shutoff valve?

If the alteration is valued at more than $10,000, yes — Los Angeles has required an earthquake-actuated gas shutoff valve on residential permits issued since January 1998. Most kitchen remodels exceed that threshold.

My panel is old. Does that hold up the kitchen?

It can if it is left to the end. A service upgrade needs a meter spot sheet from LADWP before LADBS inspects, so we start that early rather than waiting for the electrician to flag it. Upgrading a residential service up to 400 amps is itself an Express Permit item.

How long does a Woodland Hills kitchen take?

Two to four weeks of construction for a cosmetic refresh, five to eight weeks for a mid-range remodel in the same layout and eight to twelve weeks once walls or plumbing move, plus three to six weeks of design and selections and one to six weeks of permitting beforehand. Custom cabinetry takes about three weeks to manufacture and usually sets the schedule.

We are in the hills. Does that change anything for an interior kitchen?

For the permit, no — an interior kitchen remodel follows the same path anywhere in the city. What changes is logistics: access, where a delivery truck can stand, and how far materials have to be carried. We plan that into the schedule rather than absorbing it as delay.

Related: Kitchen remodeling across Los Angeles · General contractor in Woodland Hills · Bathroom remodeling in Woodland Hills · Kitchen remodel cost guide · Whole-home renovation · Our projects

Sources

Permit rules on this page are City of Los Angeles rules and can change. Confirm what applies to your address with LADBS before you plan around a date. Cost ranges and durations are our own, from jobs we have built.

• Los Angeles Municipal Code section 91.106, Permits — section 91.106.2 lists the work exempt from a building permit, including “cases, counters and partitions, not over 5 feet 9 inches high”.
• LADBS Information Bulletin P/GI 2020-003, Express Permits — the narrower list of work that can be permitted without plan check, including re-roofing and non-structural kitchen and bathroom work.
• LADBS, Counter Plan Check — the same-day counter review for simple residential alterations; LADBS states “the plans are reviewed the same day as plan submittal”, typically in 45 to 60 minutes.
• LADBS, Building Permits — the work that requires a permit in the City of Los Angeles, and the rule that building plans must be approved as a Building Plan Check before a permit is issued.
• LADBS, Van Nuys office — the Development Services Center that serves the San Fernando Valley, at 6262 Van Nuys Blvd, 2nd floor, Room 251.

Last reviewed 17 September 2026.

Tell us about your Woodland Hills kitchen

Send us the basics — the size of the kitchen, whether you want to move any walls, and roughly when you would like to start — and we will come out, take measurements and put a written scope and estimate in front of you within about 48 hours of the visit.