Are you in the market for a garage storage solution?
Garage cabinets can be a great storage option.
Whether you prefer freestanding or wall-mounted cabinets (or a combination of the two), these cabinets can help you to declutter and bring a greater level of organization to your garage. Additionally, you can choose between prefabricated or custom cabinets, with custom cabinets offering you the chance to have cabinets designed to your exact specifications.
In this article, we are talking about all things garage cabinets — from the different types of garage cabinets to choose from to the factors that can influence the total cost of a cabinet unit.
Keep reading to find out how The Garage Experience can help make your garage storage dreams a reality!
The Different Types of Garage Cabinets
Before you make any garage cabinet purchases, it is vital to know what options are available to you.
Garage cabinets can come in a few different styles, with the two main styles being freestanding cabinets and wall-mounted cabinets. In addition to style differences, garage cabinets can also be either prefabricated or custom-made for your exact needs.
Let’s dive into each of these cabinet types to help you determine which type suits your needs best:
Freestanding Garage Cabinets
Freestanding garage cabinets are a type of cabinet that stand on the floor without any wall support.
These cabinets are typically designed to be tall, with long doors that stretch over the entire height of the cabinet unit — though some may include multiple doors to create separate storage areas in the cabinet.
Benefits of freestanding garage cabinets can include:
- Adjustable Shelves: Freestanding garage cabinets are often tall, with many being 72 inches or more in height. These tall cabinets often come with adjustable shelves that can be repositioned for your convenience or to store larger items on some of the shelves. If you prefer, you may even take the shelves out entirely from some freestanding cabinets.
- Easy to Place: Thanks to being one piece of pre-assembled storage furniture, a freestanding cabinet is easy to place within your garage. For best results, we recommend putting your freestanding cabinet up against a wall to give it an extra layer of support and sturdiness. This is also the best placement to keep the unit out of the way of other garage activities.
- Moveable: Once your freestanding cabinet is placed, nothing is stopping you from moving it as needed. Unlike wall-mounted cabinets — which can take some time to get down to reposition — all that is required to move a freestanding cabinet is to remove any contents that make it too heavy to lift. After reducing the weight, you can move the cabinet unit wherever you would like.
On average, a freestanding garage cabinet can cost between $250 to $400 per unit, though the final price can vary depending on several factors that we discuss momentarily. Some freestanding garage cabinets come as bigger units with multiple sections — these units tend to be more expensive, ranging from $300 to $600 in total price.
Wall-Mounted Garage Cabinets
Wall-mounted garage cabinets are exactly as the name suggests — units that can be mounted to the wall.
Compared to freestanding cabinets, wall-mounted cabinets tend to be smaller in size (typically around 30 inches in height). This smaller size makes it easier to mount the cabinets and ensures they can only bear the amount of weight that the wall mounts can support.
Some wall-mounted cabinets can be freestanding floor cabinets as well, while others are designed specifically to be mounted and do not function as well as freestanding cabinets.
Benefits of wall-mounted garage cabinets include:
- More Garage Floor Space: By hanging your garage cabinets on the wall, you ultimately provide yourself with more garage floor space for storing other items. In some cases, you can even use mounted garage cabinets to make room for an additional freestanding unit, giving you an optimal amount of storage space within your garage.
- Greater Placement Options: When you use wall-mounted cabinets for your garage storage solution, your placement options for those cabinets become almost endless. You can place the cabinets as high or as low as needed, according to your personal height and what types of items you are storing. For instance, if you are storing items you don’t want children accessing, you can place the cabinet high enough that it is well out of reach of tiny hands.
- Easy to Mount: Most wall-mounted cabinets are designed to be easy to mount for your convenience. Generally, however, you will need a few key tools in order to secure the mounts to the wall, such as a hammer or power drill. Additionally, wall-mounted cabinets can sometimes come with installation services as well from the company that manufactured them.
In terms of price, a standard wall-mounted cabinet unit can cost between $150 to $300 on average.
Prefab Garage Cabinets
Prefab garage cabinets refer to units that were fully designed and constructed before being sold.
These types of cabinets come with a pre-determined style, meaning you must shop around a bit to find the right prefab cabinet that fits your needs. If aesthetics are important to you, you will also need to hunt for a unit that has the right look and color to match the rest of your garage as well.
The benefits of prefab garage cabinets include:
- Affordable: In general, prefab garage cabinets are more affordable than their custom alternatives. This can make prefab garage cabinets a great option for anyone working with a tight budget who needs a garage organization solution installed as soon as possible.
- Quick to Purchase: With prefab garage cabinets, you do not need to have a consultation with a cabinet production company and wait for your cabinets to be constructed. All you need to do is stop by your nearest hardware store or order a unit online to get the cabinets you want to be purchased into your garage quickly.
- Wide Variety: Though prefab garage cabinets lack customization, there is still a wide range of cabinet styles, colors, and more to choose from.
On average, prefab cabinets tend to be on the lower end of the price spectrum, ranging between $150 to $400 depending on the unit style and materials.
Custom Garage Cabinets
Custom garage cabinets require you to work with a cabinet company that can design and construct cabinets according to your exact specifications.
While this can be a pricier option compared to prefab cabinets, the most obvious benefit is that you can ask for highly specific customizations that you would not be able to find in a store or online.
Other key benefits of custom garage cabinets include:
- Optimized Size: With prefab cabinets, you are at the mercy of whatever sizes are currently available in-store or online. Meanwhile, customer cabinets can be constructed according to the dimensions you provide, allowing you to size your cabinets to fit as optimally as possible within a designated space in your garage.
- Extra Features: If you need extra features added to your garage cabinets that you cannot find in prefab cabinets, then custom cabinets are the way to go. For instance, if you have tons of electric cords and nowhere to store them, you could ask for additional hooks to be added to the exterior or interior of the cabinets for hanging wrapped cords.
- Installation: In most cases, companies that offer the fabrication of custom cabinets also offer installation services, making your life much easier when it comes time to install your new cabinets in your garage. Likewise, these types of companies will often also offer home delivery services, enabling you to have your cabinets brought right to your garage door.
Custom garage cabinets can be tricky to predict the price of due to different companies offering different rates. In general, you can expect to pay between $200 to $600 for a custom unit, though this price can be higher or lower depending on what specifications you have provided.
The trade-off for a higher price is, of course, quality and customization. Custom cabinets are fabricated for your exact needs and can be constructed from high-quality and long-lasting materials.
Factors That Affect Garage Cabinet Prices
When it comes to the price of a garage cabinet unit, many different factors can impact the total cost.
Here are three key factors to consider when selecting a garage cabinet unit:
1. Garage Cabinet Materials
Garage cabinets can be made from a range of different materials, with wood, plastic, and metal being the three main types of materials used.
Here is a breakdown of each of these materials and their cost-effectiveness.
- Plastic Garage Cabinets: Plastic garage cabinets tend to be the most affordable option thanks to the cheap price of plastic within production processes. Depending on the construction quality, plastic garage cabinets can be just as high-quality as any other cabinet. However, in general, plastic cabinets tend to lack the structural integrity of more solid materials.
- Wood Garage Cabinets: Wood garage cabinets can range fairly drastically in price depending on the type of wood used, wood treatment, and more. The biggest consideration for wood cabinets is how well-protected they are against natural weathering — you don’t want to spend the big bucks on wood cabinets just to have them rot and warp in a few years.
- Metal Garage Cabinets: Overall, metal garage cabinets offer the greatest level of sturdiness and durability. With this higher level of quality, however, there is often a higher price tag. Metal can be a tricky material to work with, requiring great skill and finesse in some cases.
2. Garage Cabinet Dimensions
After choosing the cabinet material you desire, your next key consideration is the size.
Smaller cabinets will almost always be cheaper than larger ones. However, smaller cabinets can sometimes be more expensive if they are custom-made and have non-standard dimensions chosen to fit a very specific space within your garage.
3. Garage Cabinets Installation Cost
The third and final cost factor is installation.
In general, freestanding cabinets do not require installation unless they are very heavy and need to be placed using a trolly or another type of equipment. Wall-mounted cabinets always require some form of installation, with some being permanently installed in a specific wall space.
Each company will offer its own unique installation costs. For some custom cabinet makers, the price of installation may be included in the final price.
Make sure to inquire about installation before making any purchases.
Where to Get Custom Garage Cabinets in Fairfield & Westchester Counties
If you live in Fairfield or Westchester counties, look no further than Garage Experience for all of your garage cabinet and storage solution needs.
At Garage Experience, we offer custom-designed garage cabinets that are made to your exact specifications — from short drawers to 2-door overhead cabinets. We work with your needs, goals, and budget to craft a truly extraordinary cabinet system for your garage.
Plus, our professional installation team’s services are included in all garage cabinet design projects!Get in touch with the Garage Experience team to begin optimizing your garage storage space today.
