NAIL THE BASICS ON FLOORING. WHAT FLOORING IS BEST FOR YOU? PART 1 OF 3
NAIL THE BASICS ON FLOORING. WHAT FLOORING IS BEST FOR YOU? PART 1 OF 3
NAIL THE BASICS ON FLOORING. WHAT FLOORING IS BEST FOR YOU? PART 1 OF 3
Choosing the right flooring isn’t a one-size-fits-all decision. It’s key to think about several things before picking the best floor for your space.
The flooring you choose needs to match your room, budget, and how you live. Every kind of flooring comes with its own good and bad points, and what works well in one area might not in another.
Let’s look at nine types of flooring we know a lot about.
- Hardwood
- Engineered wood
- Ceramic tiles
- Porcelain tiles
- Parquet floors
- Vinyl
- Linoleum
- Carpet
- Stone
Hardwood
Hardwood, over the years has become the most popular flooring for living spaces. These are solid planks of wooden boards that are installed by nailing to a wooden subfloor. Hardwood flooring could be made with oak, Maple, cherry, walnut, ash and mahogany and could be finished or unfinished.
Unfinished Hardwood could be slightly cheaper but involves a lot of hard work of sanding down to a finish before the actual installation. Factory finished wood might be a better choice as they tend to be more durable and involve less work, thus saving labor and time.
Hardwood goes with most decor, it looks classy and is hardy, thus making it the most popular among flooring. Hardwood floors also increase the resale value of your house. This floor is easier to clean and easier to maintain. A sanding and polishing ritual done every two years can keep the floor lasting long and looking good. Hardwood floors are best for spaces that have low traffic, like living rooms, family rooms, dining rooms and bedrooms.
However hardwood floors are not good with moisture. So they are a bad choice for bathrooms, laundry rooms or any room that could have a lot of moisture. Constant changes in temperature might make Hardwood floors shrink or swell.
Hardwood flooring fits most budgets as they typically run between $3-$12 per square foot before adding installation costs. Although hardwood might seem like a big investment, they are worth the expense considering the duration of their lifetime.
Engineered Wood
On the other hand, Engineered Wood is more cost-effective than your hardwood. Engineered Wood is also wood but it is manufactured in a way where the top layer has the wood grain and the layers underneath are less expensive plywood. Engineered wood is stronger and more stable because the mid layers have recycled wood fiber mixed with stone dust.
There is a large variety of Engineered Wood available in the market. Installation could be either nailing down the boards, just like hardwood, or getting glued down. Some engineered planks come with grooved wedges on the sides so they can be interlinked and installed as a floating floor without using nails or glue
The best thing about Engineered Wood is it is cost-effective. They are more resistant to pet scratches, more stable than wood, less sensitive to temperature and humidity and most of them almost look like real wood. But unfortunately in consideration to durability hardwood wins hands up.
While hardwood can be polished every two year for decades of lifetime, Engineered Wood can be refinished perhaps only once or twice during its short life time. Engineered Wood is most suitable for living spaces, basements turn and close to purchase. Cost of Engineered Wood runs $2-$7 per square foot with cost of professional installation just about the same as hardwood
