So we’re at the point where we need to replace a bunch of carpet. We own a townhouse in Northern Virginia, where the market was hit pretty badly. It’s still very much a buyer’s market here, and we’re trying to figure out if wood is still worth the investment.
While we were considering the wood, the carpet salesman, of course, assured us we’d make it back, plus some. Plus 100%, were his words. I tried to keep from laughing, because I just don’t believe in this market you’ll make anything back. The wood is looking to be twice as expensive as the carpet. We’re planning on doing our three bedrooms in wood, and the basement in carpet.
We may not sell the place any time soon, but in a few years, it may be an option. And by that time, I’m not sure the market will have picked up enough to warrant a $4500 investment in the wood. The carpet would be half that, at most.
Anyone have any experience with any of this–what to watch out for with flooring salesmen and installers, whether wood is the way to go, any other words of wisdom for us? Thanks in advance!
All I can tell you is, we had hardwood floors put in 10 years ago and I can’t imagine living in a house without them. When we bought the house we had cheap wall to wall carpeting installed, which looked great for a few years. Later, with use, it was just horrible, it smelled, it got matted down, it held stains, there was always a furry line of dust and dirt along the edges, and as for pet accidents - dear God! (And we had a top of the line vacuum and had it cleaned professionally every so often.) We now have to only dust mop, we have area rugs, and it just looks so much better. I know wood is expensive, but if you have to have carpet, you should have ‘good’ carpet which is expensive, plus the layer underneath, and the upkeep of that carpet has to be done faithfully. Really. Even though it’s just lying there, the heavy traffic areas have to be tended, and those cans of carpet cleaner spray don’t do squat for most stains. So I don’t know, it’s up to you, but there’s a reason hardwood floors are listed as a plus in real estate ads, and I think you could use that as a selling point. (Besides, speaking for myself, when I rented, I found the idea of walking/sitting on other people’s “used” carpet, full of dirt and hair and who knows what, kind of skeevy. If I had bought a house and I didn’t know it was brand new carpet, I would have had it pulled up. But that’s just me.)
Oh, and if you do have hardwood flooring put in, make sure the guys do, say, the landings and entrances, or anywhere the flooring is most obvious, early in the day. By quitting time, they’re getting tired and tend to do a sloppier job. Doesn’t matter so much under furniture, but you don’t want to see a creative jigsaw puzzle of wood when you first come in the door.
I would definitely be willing to pay more for a house with hardwood floors. But only if they were the “sealed” kind that don’t have to be waxed. No way am I going to find time to wax floors. And I already own a few nice oriental rugs, so that’s out of the way. Be sure to add area rugs into your cost equation, because you are unlikely to leave the hardwood entirely uncovered. It’s just too noisy that way.
But what I really think is that you should get what you want. It always concerns me when people make decisions about their home in accordance with what they are told will be the best investment. This is your home. Be comfortable. And wall-to-wall carpet with really good padding under it is nice under foot. First thing in the morning in the middle of Winter? Hard wood is cold! (Is the such a thing as soft wood flooring?!?)
In the house I’m renting now (in Burke btw) I don’t even need a cushion to sit on the floor. I am perfectly comfortable just on the carpeting, and when I step onto it it feels like putting on a pair of crocs.
Whatever you do don’t get tile. We have a tile entry/kitchen in this place and when it gets wet it is slicker than whale snot. I’ve never experienced anything as slippery as this floor when it’s wet. It’s worse than black ice; even knowing it’s wet and walking carefully I still find myself on my butt occasionally.
If by a few years you mean more than maybe 3 years, you should probably factor in replacing carpet to sell the house, unless you get really good carpet and keep it in immaculate condition.
What **salinqmind **said. We just got wood floors in this winter and I waited years for them. If I died today, one of my last thoughts would be, “I have wood floors!”
At our last apartment, we had all wood floors, and we did love it. When we purchased our current place, it was entirely carpeted. We re-did the first floor, but have waited on the upstairs (bedrooms) and basement. The basement and bedroom carpets are pretty nasty now. So we definitely want wood floors, but we’re a bit concerned not only with whether today’s market will screw us out of an investment (we’ve already lost a ton, and the thought of throwing away yet more money is painful), but also with whether it’s going to look strange having the living room, upstairs stairwell, and hallway all carpeted, then having all three bedrooms wood. Don’t people usually do the opposite?
These are good points. As far as the install goes, that’s something I’ll make sure to address with the sales guy before comitting. They should be willing to come and fix any problems we notice after they’re gone.
Have no idea what you’re talking about. When I walk into any regular old flooring shop, are they offering me unsealed wood floor? We’ve been to four or five, and no one has mentioned it. They talk about how many clearcoats are slopped on–is that the same thing?
Oh, I wish I could adopt this philosophy. And I could have, easily, when we bought this place, back in '05, at what I’m convinced is the exact moment the housing bubble burst. :mad:
Yeah, we have tile in our kitchen and bumpout, and we do like even though it can get silppery. I can’t imagine putting tile anywhere else, though.
I don’t like or really even understand the whole philosophy of carpet: “Let’s take some fabric, which easily gets dirty and is hard to clean, and nail that shit to the floor! Then we’ll walk all over it! What a great idea!”
So, I advocate wood just on principle. Looking at the price difference you are wortking with and the fact you won’t be selling for a few years, I’d say wood makes sense if your house is worth anything north of $100k.
You must have bought at the same time I did then. We’ve lost 30%+ on our place that we got at the end of 05. We want to buy a house, but we owe right what we might get. Our Realtor keeps telling us we need to replace the carpet, except I keep trying to tell him we have two little ones, the carpet will look like crap, he doesn’t listen. I wouldn’t install carpet, if that’s what you want, until right before you want to sell.
I hate wood, but it’s asked for more and more. It’s the ONLY thing ever seen installed on those flip and renovate shows - for living and dining areas. I don’t recall ever seeing a wooden bedroom upgrade, so I doubt people will as for that. You walk around in bare feet in bedrooms and don’t need a cold floor.
I hate wood because I grew up with it. Scuffs from furniture, chairs slide out from under you, dust shows daily, scuffs and stains last forever, you have to buy rugs that you trip over and that bunch up and collect dust bunnies at the edges, and make furniture unlevel when half on and half off a rug. I love wall to wall. The only trend I hated was the '70s “indoor-outdoor” carpet in kitchens and bathrooms. Ugh.
Timely thread. I’m sitting here waiting for the workmen to come and finish the laminate flooring on the other half of my downstairs.
Today’s laminates are *really *beautiful and realistic. I’ve been standing down there admiring my choice: Armstrong’s “Yorkshire Walnut” laminate, which is a light ash brown with natural-looking streaks and whorls and is also “hand-scraped”, which means there are long, realistic divots in it like it was planed off by hand. It’s tough and durable and all I have to do is Swiffer-dust it and maybe spray and mop it with a laminate cleaner.
I can’t tell you how good it felt to see all our filthy wall-to-wall carpeting ripped out and thrown away. It bore the marks of our elderly, incontinent pugs who died years ago. We never could get it clean again after that. I hate carpeting!
Another NoVa resident here, with ramblings on some things to consider. The downside of putting carpet in now is that in a few years when you’re ready to sell, the carpet won’t look so new. You may even have to replace some / all of it at that point. Hardwood will hold up better.
If you were going to sell within the next year or so, I’d say hold off and livce the ratty stuff until just before marketing the place, then replace the carpet with mid-to-low-grade carpet at that point. That plus some paint will really refresh the look of the place, and help it sell that much faster. (speaking from experience… admittedly this was 2002 but our place looked BEAUTIFUL and sold within 3 days).
Also consider how common hardwood vs. carpet is in townhouses. Most townhouses I’ve visited (and we lived in one, until 6 years ago) had carpet. Full hardwood would have been pretty unusual. If you do put hardwood in, it’ll make the place stand out and get more attention from buyers (say, vs. the neighbors’ otherwise identical place), but I doubt you’d get the full amount of your investment back (e.g. if you spend 4K on hardwood vs. 2K on carpet, I doubt you’d get 2K back). I’ve heard you don’t want to have so many upgrades that your place is miles fancier than everything else comparable. The salesman is full of hooey.
So… if you’re going to be living with your choice for a while, I wouldn’t got for carpet unless you’re prepared to redo it when you are ready to sell. If you’re thinking of living there for 4-5 years, go with hardwood with the understanding that you won’t have to redo it at sales time, but that also you won’t recoup the difference in investment. However you’ll have the enjoyment and easy care in the interim.
FYI - we moved into a house 6 years ago with immaculate-looking ivory carpet. The former owners, who’d been in the place for 6-7 years, had evidently taken great care of it. 2 months later, stains started showing up. We’re slobs, but hadn’t had TIME to mess it up that much - evidently they were old stains resurfacing from the padding / backing. We’re gradually replacing all of the carpet with hardwood - have done 3 of 4 bedrooms, plus the family room. Only the basement will remain carpeted when we’re done. It’s a slowish process as of course it’s pricey work (a thousand or more per room) but it’ll be a much longer-lasting choice.
And it dramatically changes the look of a room of course - in particular when they did the kids’ bedrooms I was shocked when I went in at the end of the day to inspect the results.
This is so true!! I’ve also heard tile is hard to stand on for extended periods of time (as in, say, a kitchen). We do have tile in the bathroom and that’s fine - we wipe up drips there and that’s what bathmats are for anyway. But I once stayed in a house in Florida with tile throughout, and a pool just outside the back door, and Yep - flat on my ass more than once.
For a kitchen, my druthers is honestly… vinyl / lino / whatever. Easy to keep clean, not hideously expensive, no nooks / crannies for crumbs to get caught in… Our current house has hardwood in the kitchen and that’s the one room I hate having the stuff in. Unfortunately due to the layour of the place (continuous with hallway / entryway), it’s not feasible to remove the hardwood in the kitchen.
I’d go with wood. The buyer can always carpet over it if they want to.
I want wood the next time around, but my husband seems to think carpeting is a must in our drafty old house. We have wood already, but it would need to be completely re-finished.
If you can’t do the whole house in wood, AFAIK the favored wood+carpet combo is wood in the public rooms (family room, living room, hall, maybe kitchen) and carpet in the private rooms (bedrooms). This makes sense because wood is perceived to be fancier and is trendier, but carpet is warmer and usually cheaper.
I would definitely think it was a bit strange to have wood in the bedrooms and carpet in the living room, stairs, and hall. Strange enough that on that basis alone, I think I would either do wood throughout or replace the bedroom carpets. And on the basis of cost of doing wood throughout, I’d almost certainly just replace the carpeting with new carpeting.