Daggumm........Flooring is expensive!!!!!!!!!!

[redgtxdi]

So a buddy of mine is contemplating some hardwood flooring. I've researched, but not a whole lot on pricing. Good suggestions though.

My guess is that in the world of hardwood flooring...........you get what you pay for. (i.e. Expensive laminate is gonna be good stuff........expensive hardwood, ditto).

He's tossed between $4/sqft on laminate or $6.50 /sqft on hardwood. (The hardwood is a cherry though and aside from oak, I don't know how Cherry would stand up as flooring so I can't give him any advice there.)

I told him to get back w/ me on warranties for both as well.

Man...........refloor a couple thousand sq. ft. and you're talkin' some bucks!!!!

I consider myself pretty lucky to have gotten free carpeting after our builder had to revisit a subflooring prob 8 years after the build........(10yr warranty).........so just a couple years ago we got new carpeting. Just the basic stuff, but I can't imagine spending $10K on flooring at this point in my life. I'd friggin' gag!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

[daweeze02]

i laid laminate flooring in my rooms of my house, i know its nothing like hardwood, but at a 1/3 even a 1/4 of the price i love it.

 

[MustISO]

I think we spent $5,000 on carpet for our basement. It's sick.

 

[redgtxdi]

But I think the *quality* of flooring is a strong consideration.

i.e.

cheap laminate vs. quality laminate (like 5yr warranty vs. 25yr warranty)

cheap hardwood vs. quality hardwood (10yr warranty vs. 30yr??)


Sure, cheap laminate may be 1/3 the cost of medium quality hardwood, but that difference may make the medium quality hardwood weellllll worth the difference??

 

[redgtxdi]

Here's what's goin' down if one of my kids ever screws up their room's carpet beyond repair............

Paneling is king


And that's *IF* I don't just let the concrete slab become their new floor...........

"Hey, would somebody toss me the box cutter? Here ya' go. There's yer new floor! It's called "concrete"!!!"

:laugh:

 

[TStep]

http://www.senecahardwoods.com/b5145h/listing.asp?dept_id=15&nopopup=1

Tell me about it. Just dropped $9000. Got my stuff from the above link. I was able to check it out beforehand as it's only 2 hours away from me. I have not put it down yet, but the stuff looks pretty good and the owner seems to be a gentleman. He even took the time to meet me on a Sunday and show me the mill and his stock. It's worth giving him a call even if you have to ship it across the country.

 

[spidey07]

Yeah, but one thing is never skimp on flooring.

The cheap stuff (no matter if it is carpet, hardwood, etc) just won't last. Look at the prices on GOOD carpet. Insane.

 

[TStep]

Originally posted by: redgtxdi
Here's what's goin' down if one of my kids ever screws up their room's carpet beyond repair............

Paneling is king


And that's *IF* I don't just let the concrete slab become their new floor...........

"Hey, would somebody toss me the box cutter? Here ya' go. There's yer new floor! It's called "concrete"!!!"

:laugh:

solid 3/4" hardwood is not always the best way to go over concrete floor.

 

[redgtxdi]

Hmmmmmmmm..........looks nice!!! (Of course hardwoods usually do!)

And what exactly does the $9K cover in your case???

Which one did you pick???

 

[TStep]

I'm finishing up a timberframe, so mill-run grade (fine, tight knots with a mix of heart and sap) works perfectly for me. I went with about

1500 sf of 5 1/4" wide Cherry
400 sf of 4 1/4" Black Walnut
1500 sf of 2 1/2" Maple

The cherry and the black walnut are only about 80% as hard as Oak, but I'm not worried too much. They had a Cherry conference room in his shop that was about 20 years old and it still looked great.

 

[redgtxdi]

Ah.........very cool!!!

Thanks for the feedback about the Cherry. His only kid is grown by now, but that doesn't mean that small kids are the only ones who can damage a floor.



I figure every...........what..........10 years (?).......is a good time to replace flooring?? (not hardwood or tile, but like carpeting, vinyl?)

If so.........in 2013, I'll simply drop to my knees in the middle of the family room and cry while my wife cuts the flooring people a check for like $10K!

It'll just be easier that way if I don't get involved!!!

(Otherwise we might end up w/ some nice bamboo floors...........well............the bamboo I find in the fields that I would glue together to call our "new floor".............LMAO!!!)

 

[IronWing]

We ripped out all the carpeting in our house (carpeted bathrooms, yech) and replaced with tile. The saltillo was the cheapest at ~US$10 / sq ft installed. The ceramic tile ran ~US$15 /sq ft installed. The maze (limestone, serpentine, glass, copper plates, and ceramic) cost ~$30/ sq ft installed. The labor cost drove up the price of the maze as the tile layers had to consider the placement of each tile instead of slapping and slamming.

 

[TStep]

The one advantage to 3/4" solid over the laminates and veneer wood floors is that you can get quite a few refinishings on them. There is about 1/4" of wood that can be sanded away before you get to the nails.

 

[redgtxdi]

Originally posted by: ironwing
We ripped out all the carpeting in our house (carpeted bathrooms, yech) and replaced with tile. The saltillo was the cheapest at ~US$10 / sq ft installed. The ceramic tile ran ~US$15 /sq ft installed. The maze (limestone, serpentine, glass, copper plates, and ceramic) cost ~$30/ sq ft installed. The labor cost drove up the price of the maze as the tile layers had to consider the placement of each tile instead of slapping and slamming.

In essence you just said $20K for a 2,000sqft house.

Ohmmmph..................(I just threw up in my mouth a little.......I'm okay).

 

[IronWing]

Originally posted by: redgtxdi

Originally posted by: ironwing
We ripped out all the carpeting in our house (carpeted bathrooms, yech) and replaced with tile. The saltillo was the cheapest at ~US$10 / sq ft installed. The ceramic tile ran ~US$15 /sq ft installed. The maze (limestone, serpentine, glass, copper plates, and ceramic) cost ~$30/ sq ft installed. The labor cost drove up the price of the maze as the tile layers had to consider the placement of each tile instead of slapping and slamming.

In essence you just said $20K for a 2,000sqft house.

Ohmmmph..................(I just threw up in my mouth a little.......I'm okay).

No. The total carpeted area had been about 700 sq ft. The maze was 121 sq ft. The rest of the floor was already done in saltillo by a previous owner.

 

[redgtxdi]

Oh, OK. The wording in your previous post kinda' threw me there. Sounded like *you* shopped & bought all the flooring.




So I got back from my buddy that both floors are 25yr warranty.

Laminate = $4/sqft installed!!!

Cherry = $6.50/sqft installed!!

x 1,500sq ft. (if he decides to do the whole thing) = ............wait........I just threw up in my mouth again.........I'm okay!!




So what, then, would be theeeeeeeee absolute cheapest thing you could floor your house with???


(Well, besides my idea of either bare concrete or maybe some newspaper......ROTFLmAO!!)

 

[arcas]

If you're going to install hardwood flooring (the real stuff, not the laminate stuff), you need to do a couple things:

1) Buy a book or attend a how-to workshop and install and finish it yourself (rent the tools). Or find a friend who has installed flooring and see if you can get the friend's price. You'll pay out the ass to have a contractor do it for you.
2) Most importantly, buy your flooring directly from a lumber mill instead of a home improvement store. You'll get the same stuff but it'll be much, much cheaper. You might have to drive 100 miles or more to get it or have it trucked in but the money you save will more than make up for it.