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Hardwoods

winecastle14winecastle14 member
in Parenting
Disclaimer: this is actually about hardwoods. Sorry to disappoint

Need some help bumps frands. We want to put hardwoods on our main floor. We went to Home Depot last weekend to look at some and we were originally thinking real hardwoods or the engineered kind (cheaper), but the HD guy made us reconsider. He told us that laminate has come a long way and showed us brand that looks just like the real deal. It's very appealing since laminate doesn't get beat up nearly as easily. Since we have a toddler and two dogs (with hopefully more kids in the future), that's a big plus for us. I don't want to hurt the resale value on our home though by not installing real wood. We can't decide what to do. Any suggestions?

Also, we don't know if we want to put hardwoods in the kitchen and half bath or do another type of floor (most likely tile). I know water on hardwoods isn't ideal, so a lot of people choose not to put them in the kitchen and bath because of that. Tile is so hard though and it makes me worry about the kiddos getting hurt.
 
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Re: Hardwoods

  • insertclevernameinsertclevername member
    We have hardwood and I love it. If you plan to sell it will definitely help resale value. You can refinish hardwood you cannot with laminate. We have bamboo flooring as well and I am not a fan. It already has a number of cracks on some of the planks. We have marble tile in the kitchen and stone tile in the bathroom. While tile is a hard surface kitchens and bathrooms are usually small areas so not a ton of room for kids to run around.
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  • Mags748Mags748 member
    We had laminate in our last house for 7 years and it still looked brand new with a crazy 55 lb dog that would tear across the floor and two kids who we let use the little tykes car and ride on toys in the house. This house was brand new when we moved in 7 months ago and we have engineered wood. There are already tons of surface scratches. If we would have built this home instead of just buying already built, I would have put in laminate for price and practicality.
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  • winecastle14winecastle14 member
    Thanks everyone! Great info.

    @Chickie79‌ haaiii!!! I'm so glad you're here. Would you PM me the info, please? That would be super helpful. Stay around and play :)
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  • [Deleted User][Deleted User] member
    Another option to consider is tile that resembles wood.

    https://products.daltile.com/catalog.cfm?look=wood

    These are also rated for commercial floors, so they last a long time.
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  • winecastle14winecastle14 member
    Thanks @overture. The Home Depot guy did show us those as well. I couldn't believe how much they looked like the real thing. Craziness. I think it may be a little too hard of a surface for us to have throughout our whole house. Awesome concept though. 
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  • NotSharknadoNotSharknado member
    I have pergo in the entire house except kitchen in bathroom. I like it but I'd prefer the real deal. I would not do pergo in my kitchen because if you got grease from cooking on it you'd notice it. It would personally drive me nuts. Real hardwood throughout would be my only choice.
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  • NotSharknadoNotSharknado member
    spotco2 said:

    Real hardwoods (unfinished when installed, then sanded and finished) are one of the most valuable things you can add to a home.  We have refinished and repaired these floors that had lasted 50-75 years. Just did one that was built in the 50's and replaced a couple of boards, sanded and finished. Looked brand new when we were done. True hardwood will last the lifespan of your home. It is truly an investment that will pay for itself time and time again.

    Prefinished are ok, still 3/4 wood but tends to have cracks between the boards where dirt and hair can get. Also you don't have the slick finish like regular wood. Also these can only be refinished 1-2 times before needing to be replaced.

    Engineered looks really nice until it starts to wear. Then it's replacement only and good luck if you have to repair a spot fining a piece that matches.

    Laminates look fantastic. We put them in our rentals. You can't hardly destroy them but you can tell what you are walking on as soon as you step on them. Again, any damage and you replace the entire room usually.

    Any room that might have water gets tile.

    Put down some area rugs for the kids to play on. Stack 2 on top of each other for extra padding.




    If there was damage on the laminate you wouldn't have to replace everything. We put in 3 new planks and you can't even tell. The recent ones are next to 7 year old planks.
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  • winecastle14winecastle14 member
    Great info @NotSharknado. Thank you!
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  • NotSharknadoNotSharknado member
    You can't tell which planks are old and which are newimage
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  • NotSharknadoNotSharknado member
    Oh and the sound of your dogs walking on the laminate would drive you batty.
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  • winecastle14winecastle14 member
    NotSharknado said:
    Oh and the sound of your dogs walking on the laminate would drive you batty.
    You are so right!!
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  • NotSharknadoNotSharknado member
    mbenit4 said:

    I never notice my dog walking. That seems odd.



    Not surprised.
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  • meggyskimeggyski member
    I'd steer clear of laminate- we have some fake wood laminate in our dining room that we're about to replace. We have two big dogs and it does scratch easily, plus you can tell that it's fake, and the floor floats, so it cracks and pops, which drives me nuts. It's older than the laminate you are describing, and I'm sure the technology has come a long way, but you will definitely get a higher-quality, longer lasting floor with hardwoods, whether real or engineered. 

    Since you have dogs, I'd get engineered or solid wood, with the highest Janka rating you can find (janka rating is based on a test where they drop steel balls from different heights to test the durability of the floor). Here's a chart that shows Janka ratings for different species: https://www.lumberliquidators.com/ll/flooring/JankaRating 

    I'd go with something with a Janka rating of over 2,000 for big dogs. Engineered woods with those ratings are generally a lot less expensive than pure hardwoods with similar ratings (those tend to be the rare, expensive ones like Brazilian walnut, Koa, etc). We went with strand woven bamboo in our living room because it was a good value (note: do not do horizontal or vertical bamboo, those are WAY softer than strand-woven). Our floors are 5 years old now and they look great. The negative to strand woven and many other engineered hardwoods is that you can't refinish them, but if the Janka rating is high enough you shouldn't have to worry about that. 

    Traditional solid hardwoods like Oak are beautiful and you can refinish them, but they won't hold up as well to dogs as an engineered wood with a higher Janka rating. Here's a photo of our living room floor for reference (this was when it was still under construction so it's dirty, but you get the idea). Good luck!

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  • winecastle14winecastle14 member
    @meggyski‌ thank you!!
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  • klondikebarklondikebar member
    You might want to look into DuraCermaic tiles for your kitchen and bath. We have it in our basement bath. It's a limestone based tile. It's like a cross between ceramic tile and laminate. While it doesn't hold up quite as well as ceramic, it's way softer on the feet and kids' heads.

    https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/236x/1e/60/2a/1e602a4261a90b9c761ebe748b780318.jpg    https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/236x/47/2c/07/472c076006afed606241716dd0db828a.jpg 
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  • winecastle14winecastle14 member
    Thanks @Klondikebar ! I'm learning so much on this thread. You guise are so smart  =D>
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  • spotco2spotco2 member
    NotSharknado said:
    If there was damage on the laminate you wouldn't have to replace everything. We put in 3 new planks and you can't even tell. The recent ones are next to 7 year old planks.
    That's because you have Pergo. I should have said that a lot of the big box stores will sell a specific brand for a couple of years and change brands. Once they do, sometimes it can be very difficult to locate matching laminate if it's still in production. Some of these big box lines seem to vanish after a few years and are impossible to find. These are typically some of the cheaper brands.

    Pergo is good stuff, has been around for many years and will continue to be available for many years to come. It's also a lot more expensive than some of the other laminates available.

    We normally use the cheaper and just replace the floor when we need to. I think Alure or Traffic Master was the last one we did. It looked like real wood but was a combination of vinyl and paper with a sticky strip on one side and end. Super cheap, can do a house in a day and we consider it disposable.
    Proud 40 year old, first time daddy!
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  • TiffanyBerryTiffanyBerry member
    We have bamboo in one room, and it's awesome and has stood up to the dog's nails well.
    We have cork in another room, and I like it for many reasons (softer than the bamboo, warmer than the bamboo or the tile), but it doesn't hold up as well to the dog's nails.  (Fortunately, you can't actually *SEE* any of the damage, due to the cork pattern, without laying on the floor and looking really hard.)
    We have tile in the kitchen, and I wouldn't change that - I don't want to have to deal with hardwood in there.
    We have vinyl tile in the bathrooms and honestly, I'm happy with that too - warmer than the ceramic tile in the kitchen, too.
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  • katlizabethkatlizabeth member
    Nothing new to add, but we chose to install hardwood from lumbar liquidators ourselves, and it went well. (I felt we ready had no choice because the bedrooms and hall were already hardwood, although my father in law thought some laminate would look fine in our dining room, een though you could see the hardwood floors in the hall from our dining room) there are scratches and dings, but I know we can refinish. Our original floors are 60 plus years old and still look wonderful (we did refinish them). We don't have dogs, but I agree with pp who said that dogs walking on laminate will drive you crazy (friends have this).
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