Have you paid her a substantial retainer? As in at least 2K? If so, then sure, ask her about the details that are driving the costs and where she would suggest cutting to meet your budget. I wouldn't willy nilly dive into a quote without her assistance though. Cabinet quotes are a foreign language and need interpretation or you may think you can cut something out that you actually can't. Pricing in some lines is insanely hard, as each modification has it's own code line with no explanation anywhere except a spreadsheet at the beginning of the spec book. It is horribly time consuming for some cabinet lines to even get an estimate. Even if you use the industry standard cabinet company supported 2020, pricing is still extremely time consuming.

If you haven't paid a retainer, it's time to pony up and pay it. People only do so much work for free, and your allotment has run out.

Thank you for your answer. No retainer. I am using a kitchen and bath company who are dealers for a few types of kitchen cabinet lines (Plain and fancy & omega) and they provided the quote based on a mutual design (me/her) using the P&F cabinetry line. I just assumed that when I looked at the drawings (24 in with ROS - roll outs) it can easily be associated with a price. Thank you for taking the time to write a response.

I am in the process of a gut kitchen and bathroom. It's your $$$ and YOUR kitchen. I would say ask as many questions as you want. The more information you have the better choices you will make. When I first started with the cabinets in the kitchen I went to a kitchen store. You have to watch what they give you. Example my kitchen function just fine I pretty much wanted the same lay out. The store gave me 4 bottom drawers and I only needed 3. The price was 17,000 for cabinets and that did not include the bathroom cabinets. I then went to Home Depot and they wanted $14,000. not including the bathroom. I ended up with custom cabinets for kitchen and bathroom total $15,000. It pays to ask questions and shop around. Lots of work to put together a new kitchen.

Then it is time to pay the retainer if you want more work.

If the kitchen designer is going to just make stuff up / lie, they can do that at any stage.

That said, I get where you are coming from. A really good KD should be using their expertise to help you achieve your priorities in a cost effective manner. But it's not like you work with a KD on multiple projects and have a long term relationship. You can't really tell if they are good or not. Some are great, some really stink. And when the KD works for the retailer, even very skilled KDs are not necessarily motivated to achieve cost effective solutions.

And, as pointed out, since you aren't committed to the cabinet purchase, at this point your KD has no assurance they will be paid at all.

So I think the best approach is to be honest - say that you have questions around the cost of changes and see if they will walk you through a couple of examples. Then at some point you need to either walk or commit. And that is probably before they will give you a complete cost breakdown of every potential tweak.

Easy answer: don't work with anyone you can't trust.