Regardless of whether your trying a DIY flooring project or have hired a trusted contractor, mistakes can happen. Working with experienced flooring contractors does reduce the chances of errors. However, there are three letahl flooring mistakes that can wreck your investment when it comes to flooring.
The worst thing about these errors is that they can go virtually unnoticed until you're an advanced stage of floor renovation and have already spent most of your budget. Take a read an make sure you steer clear of these errors.
Mistake #1: Lack of Cohesion
Your home's flooring can either tie together your dècor or detract from it. You've probably been in houses where the entryway features hardwood floors, the dining room carpeting, and the kitchen vinyl tile. Not the best overall look, right?
Unless these spaces are distinctly separated by doors, radically different flooring can make a home look sloppy and disconnected. This doesn't mean that you need the same flooring throughout your home. However, you should take a close look at which areas are visible from different spots.
If you can see the dining room from the entryway, consider using the same flooring in these areas. A very popular way to avoid this mistake is to install hardwood flooring through an entire floor of your home.
Hardwood is a popular choice for this approach because it looks beautiful in most first-floor rooms, such as living rooms, dining rooms and kitchens (upstairs rooms are usually distinctly separated, and can feature very different flooring without clashing). Each room can be decorated differently, and area rugs can add personality while maintaining a harmonious appearance.
Mistake #2: Failure to Research Materials
This mistake has several different aspects. When choosing flooring, far too many homeowners make a decision based solely on visual appeal. Different flooring is more appropriate for different areas of your home. The following are a few things to keep in mind when selecting your new floor.
- Level of Wear and Use - If your household includes children or pets, or if you simply have a large family, your flooring is going to take more abuse than average. You need flooring which can withstand this abuse while retaining its original beauty. For example, limestone and other natural stone tiles are a visually stunning flooring choice, but they can stain rather easily. This makes them a poor choice for busy kitchens. Hardwood, vinyl tile and finished concrete would all be better choices.
- Creating a Healthy Home - Thanks to the green revolution, more homeowners than ever are looking into environmentally friendly alternatives. This extends to your flooring options. Certain inexpensive types of flooring can give off chemical vapors for years after installation. Many of these vapors are suspected carcinogens, and they're all irritating to people with allergies. Do your research and purchase a brand of flooring which has been manufactured without the use of harmful chemicals.
- Safety Considerations - Children and older adults can fall and hurt themselves easily on a slick, glossy floor. For this reason, many households are better suited to padded carpeting. If you want to combine safety with the look of a hardwood or laminate floor, make large area rugs part of your dècor. You may want to avoid certain materials altogether, such as rock-hard polished concrete.
- Ease of Installation - If you're installing your new floor yourself, it's important to take the required skill level into account. There are many types of flooring which have been specifically designed for DIY installation. Popular options include laminate squares which mimic the look of traditional hardwoods and vinyl tiles. On the other hand, many types of flooring are very difficult to install properly without a lot of experience. Traditional hardwoods, padded carpeting and grouted tile are a few examples of flooring which is usually best installed by professionals, unless you have a great deal of flooring experience.
Mistake #3: Cutting Too Many Corners
During these tough economic times, it's natural to want to save as much money as possible. However, being a smart consumer doesn't always mean using the cheapest possible materials and labor. Cutting corners by hiring a disreputable contractor or handyman is asking for trouble.
This practice can lead to poor workmanship, workers who show up late or don't show up at all, and many other issues, big and small. When hiring professionals, seek out the lowest reasonable bid from a reputable contractor, using materials which are budget-friendly but still high-quality. You can shop around for the best deals, or ask your contractor for tips on finding quality materials at discounted prices.
If you're tackling your flooring project on a DIY basis, don't make the mistake of purchasing the absolute cheapest materials you can find. This is another sure way of ending up with a less-than-successful project. Extremely inexpensive products and materials are more likely to be flimsy and contain harmful chemicals. Shop for discounts on quality products; in the end, the extra expense is money well spent, since you won't be looking at a repair or replacement within a few short years.
Finding the Best Professional Help
Whether you hire a pro for all or just part of your flooring project, there are some common mistakes involved in the hiring process. These mistakes can leave you with an unsatisfactory floor, cause your project to take much longer than necessary, or cost you extra money.
We do not suggest DIY for flooring unless you have experience in the type of flooring you're going to install. On the other hand, working with an inexperienced or dubious contractor can prove even worse than DIY. That's why TrustedPros.ca goes out on a limb to make sure that the homeowners are presented the complete picture regarding the background, reviews, ratings, licenses, and past projects of the contractors they're considering to hire.
Our helpful free tools such as contractor search, project photos, TrustScore, and Hiring Guide allow you to take the right decision and hire a trusted professional who will do the job right the first time and leave you with a floor you can boast about.
Posted by: Diane SheppardSuggested Reading For You
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