Flooring choices

Hey Salla,

If you do a search under flooring or floors you will come up with a number of hits with respect to types of flooring.

Choices are basically carpet, timber (floating or direct stick to concrete), laminate, tiles or lino. For a house, you can probably rule out tiles, and the other choices will be dependant on how much you want to spend, what type of substrate you have (concrete or timber joists), where you are located and what look you are after.

I have just finished my place with a laminate which is certainly cheap and is really hard wearing, but the overall finish is not as good as real timber. Still looks pretty good though. Overall cost, $1800 for 120 m2 and a full weekend of pulling up carpet and putting down laminate.

Hope this has helped.

Jan

Salla,

I am in the process of having an apartment being built and chose to replace the carpet (being the builder’s choice for the 5 apartments) for the living & kitchen areas, with a floating timber floor. Agonised over that decision for a while. Tassie Oak.

Ultimately thought the finish would suite the potential tenants, differentiate between the other 4 apts and be a more modern choice than tiles (kitchen) & carpet (living area).

Salla,

I am a full tiem renovator and have for starters, seen some very poor “floating timber” floors installed. If you want timber flooring, do not go cheap, it looks cheap, wears cheap and will not be ceap to replace down the track. A possible problem with timber flooring is future water damage. A substantial leak/spill will damage the timber.

KDT, I beg to differ about the younger generation preferring timber flooring. It is still a matter of personal preference. I had large ceramic tiles in my last renovation and it was taken by a young couple, at a great price to me. The place I am doing now I am putting down very big polished porcelain tiles, it will be classy modern, almost unbeatable! Agree with the costing though, sorry, didn’t pick that up. Yeah, cost….true. Though good timer- excellent results for a long long time, bad laminate fake- possibly poor results, higher maintenance, less durable.

I don’t think much needs to be said about carpet as a floor covering, if you were going to do that, selection would be most important.

If you want to go “funky”/warehouse look and really appeal to younger generation you could have a crack at polished concrete flooring….hehe…if you do, send me a photo. I almost did it in the last place, almost.

Oh, lino. Negative.

Hope this helps.

J.

Hi e,

You can pay anywhere from $15 to $100+ per square metre for floating floors dependant on what you want. The base model is a cheaper laminate which has very little real timber in it (mostly chip board). Top of the range can be solid timber but can get variations of the above. The bamboo floating floors look pretty cool if that is your style.

As for durability, the laminate I have got was $18 per metre but is extremely durable. My two retrievers havn’t made a scratch on it yet!!

cheers

Jan

No idea what these guys are like, but this is one place in Qld. http://www.bamboo-oz.com.au/flooring/.

Gives you an idea anyway! good luck!

We have pulled up old,old carpet in two houses and found good floor boards so we polished them. No trouble renting and no complaints as tenants can have their own colouring in rugs. Currently we are just finishing renovating a house we have had for 3 years which was in need of tidying up. It already has floor boards which we have to seal as some of the no more gaps or whatever has come out. The floor has worn really well and looks good with gloss estapol. We did a unit with floating timber floor in the kitchen area and carpet, mainly because it was an upstairs unit and would be quieter and it looked great. In another unit, we tiled the kitchen area and put a good modern sisal carpet, looked fantastic.

It’s a matter of choice but I always think of durability as our places are tenanted. We put a medium, but good quality carpet and tiles to suit the house or unit and type of renovation.

The laminated flooring we put in our own house a couple of years ago is disappointing and I would not use it again. There is a problem with a couple of edges where there has been moisture and some scratches from furniture that were not supposed to happen. I am careful too!

For Hugo, the flooring is available at any carpet/flooring outlets, Harvey Norman, even Bunnings but get all the information you can on the different types. Preferably don’t get one that has to be glued, just clicked together. We have done both.

Anna

Hi Salla,

Polishing the boards if you have them is a super idea. Don’t pay to get it done. Im not suggesting it is easy but it is a skill that once learned will be extremely valuable and save you a couple of thousand per reno. This equates to quite alot of positive cash flow earned.
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If you dont have boards or you wish to replace damaged boards then get someone skilled in to show you how to do this at least for the first few times.
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You can find good quality pine flooring for between $1.50 and $1.80 per lineal meter. Each board is around 100mm wide so that means 10 boards wide times 1 meter equals a square meter (sorry).
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To get them at this price you may need to head to an auction centre. I would not recommend bidding for the goods like all the other weekenders. These places run on a very tight margin and will be happy to disclose the reserves and sell early in the week before auction. Build a relationship with these people. Do a good deal and negotiate but try and stay friendly.
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If pine is to light there a many products you can stain it with before you apply the polish or sealant. This (if done well) will definitely give you the WOW factor you are after.
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TILES: Great idea especially for kitchens and wet areas. We have never paid more than $9 a square meter for them. You need to go to tile houses and look for end runs or again auction centres. An end run is the left over tiles of each palet or discontinued lines. Only use white or other neutral colours as some of the tiles out there may date very quickly.
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What about the weather. If it is very cold where you are be careful how much bare floor you have in your home. Pontential buyers may be able to spend a few extra dollars buying cool rugs to put on the floor but you can’t assume that everyone has the extra cash. Also learn to lay tiles yourself but start with a small area like a laundry floor and work your way up.
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Vinyl floor is also another viable option and alot of the new products represent a very high quality alternative as compared with the lino of years ago.
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If you have the room keep any spare tiles, floor stain and boards, sealant etc and clearly mark it with the house its from and the date you applied it. It can be very hard to try and match these later. This is the beauty of floor boards because you can just hire the sander and go straight over them if they are damaged and re stain them. It doesnt really matter if some of the rooms look a little different and can add character.
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Have fun.
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Good Luck.
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Try ebay for your flooring needs, pretty cheap if you are after product only. I have used a few on there over the years.

We are all made from Stars

I have my own floorcovering outlet and am more than happy to give some free advise Ph 0438 797 292 or [email protected]