so, let's hear it. the good, the bad, the ugly. our jenn-air is over 20 years old, and the gasket seals are splitting, and getting leaky. probably time for a new something or other.

i think jenn-air has been bought by maytag, not sure.

what else is out there that's good value for the buck? i'm thinking 18 cubic feet, more or less, but that'd be a start.

and what brand/product should i definitely stay away from?

thanks in advance. oh, a shopping we shall go...

I've always had Sears, last for ten years.

our jenn-air replaced a GE. we bought it prior to 2000 at a local sell-all called Roberds. they shut the doors in 2000. we've had gasket reworked about 3-4 years ago. and it's leaking again. not a good solution to have a fridge that lets water puddle on the floor.

kenmore is sears, right? and is sears going strong? just asking. have heard of kitchen aid, but never been around one. locally, it's either home depot or loews pretty much.

All of the brands mentioned in the posts above, except for the GE, are now owned and built by Whirlpool. Whirlpool has bought up most of their competition, lowered quality and moved much of the manufacturing out of the country.
Good luck, expect about 5 years an any new fridge.
Google refrigerator reviews and see what the appliance technicians are saying.
I replaced all of my major appliances with Kitchen Aid (Whirlpool) in 2008 and none of them lasted over 6 years without requiring service, except for the microwave.

I'd replace the seals. It's likely to out last anything you buy new for under $1500.

I bought an LG in 2007. It's still chugging with no problems other than the ice dispenser got frozen one time. Pulled it and thawed it out. Worked fine ever since. I suspect all brands are a crap shoot though. I do clean dust out from the back lines once or twice a year as maintenance.

yep, lot's of varieties and flavors out there. before we bought the jenn-air, we'd used GE nearly forever. when it broke, we replaced. a good enough system i reckon. we use to have an old frigidare back in the day. couldn't wear it out, just had to de-frost the beast from time to time.

i guess it's coming to the point to just buy something that looks good, and use it. when it quits throw it out, and buy the latest, best model on the showroom floor as a replacement. makes sense i guess.

our jenn-air has been a beast, but it's 20 years old.

Gus I think your last post is pretty much the current way of the world. I don't think they make one like our 30 y.o. Frigidare anymore. Like water heaters you are probably looking at a 8-10 yr life cycle.

Get any of the major brands with the features you like, but buy the longest extended warranty available to go with it. That's the way it works now. Gone are the days when you buy one and it just goes and goes, decade after decade.

PS The fewest special features (Ice maker, water, etc.) will equate to the fewest breakdowns, generally speaking.

Same here will go with L G or samsung as per washer and dryer fantastic quality and quite good price

for the most part they are all cheaply made these days.....buy the one that has the features you want and make sure you get the extended warr. when they ask if you want it.....

Bought a Sears fridge a couple weeks back. It is an LG. Sales guy told us all their fridges are built by LG (Korea).

1/5th of the price of the American made Kitchen Aid built-in it replaced. The Kitchen Aid went 16 years and required about two grand worth of servicing during it's life span.

Remains to be seen how durable it is. To bad the US has ceded the bulk of the home appliance market to offshore manufacturers.

Whatever brand you choose, DO NOT get a french door/bottom freezer model. They suck.

We were shopping dishwashers, when salesman asked what I expected to get out of a new one, one thing I said was that it last a while without breaking. His reply was, new appliances last 6-7 years. He didn't grin, look at the floor or apologize. WTF, everything is $1k plus and it is s chitt in 6 years and they are not ashamed to even say that.

My Kenmore (sears) is still keeping everything cold after 15 years, the ice maker died last year and after checking on the repair price ($500) I decided not to put that much in a 15 year old frig. Started looking around and like the LG models and will most likely go that way.

As for the ice maker the feature my wife liked was getting crushed ice dispensed in front and that still works fine, so every couple of weeks I grab a $2 bag of ice to refill it. So as long as it keeps running $35 a year for ice beats shelling out $2K+ for a new unit.

yep, more than one way to skin a cat. we're on the search now, loews & home depot are the two go-to stores, and walk the aisles and see what they have.

Our fridge is 17 and getting tired. We have started checking Lowe's and Home Depot when near them. They get damaged units that still have warranty, they sell them at a good discount. If the damage will be concealed, it's a great deal.

Whirlpools are made in Amana , Iowa, our son-in-law is a computer programmer for Whirlpool , I've toured the plant.

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The Whirlpool Corporation is an American multinational manufacturer and marketer of home appliances, headquartered in Benton Charter Township, Michigan, United States, near Benton Harbor, Michigan. The Fortune 500 company has annual revenue of approximately $21 billion, 100,000 employees, and more than 70 manufacturing and technology research centers around the world. The company markets Whirlpool, Maytag, KitchenAid, Jenn-Air, Amana, Gladiator GarageWorks, Inglis, Estate, Brastemp, Bauknecht, Indesit, and Consul. Whirlpool Corporation is the world's largest home appliance maker.

Grew up with a traditional top freezer bottom fridge unit. Seemed fine.

My current is a side by side. Sucks holy azz.

I'm thinking a dedicated freezer and a full size fridge is the way to role

Whatever brand you get, make sure that if the power goes out that you do not need to manually reset it to get it to come on again. Have a client that this happened to. The power went off while they were out of town for a long weekend. All food in fridge was ruined. Cannot seem to recall the brand off hand.

Nowadays, with household appliances, like so many other things, it's hard to keep up with who owns what brand names and even harder to figure out specifically which model(s) are sold under what brand name(s).

Also it's been my experience that usually a particular model of a certain brand may have either excellent or trouble prone reviews but not necessarily representative of every other model sold under that brand name as some models may be manufactured by different companies.

" There are only a limited number a major appliance manufacturers left in the marketplace. Over the years, the big ones have bought up the smaller ones and merged those product designs into their own product lines. They now produce products under the various brand names they own.

Often there is only cosmetic differences in the appearance of the appliance, while the underlying mechanical workings are very similar, if not the same. The manufacturers warranty may also differ between brands and models.

To aid in comparing new appliances, I have compiled a list of some of the major appliance manufacturers and the brand names they own. I have also tried to note where a product with a particular brand name varies greatly from the other brands of the same manufacturer. "

http://www.appliance411.com/purchase/make.shtml

joken2 that is very helpful information. thanks for the posting.

lot's of good ideas here, the search goes on. most folks can't live without a fridge these days.