I am purchasing a home and need to change the flooring before moving in. It is a 1500 sq foot house including garage, laundry room etc. I have already picked out carpet for the 3 bedrooms but am trying to decide on laminate wood floors or tile? It would be in the rest of the house including hallway, living room, and kitchen. I have heard tile floors are great, yet hard to clean, and hurt people‘s legs. I haven‘t heard too much about the laminate floors.Any opinions, suggestions, stories?? I would really appreciate it!
If you can afford to put in a porcelain tile then you can do a hard wood.And when you say a laminate wood, I assume you mean a engineered wood which is a laminated wood as opposed to a laminate which is a good product when you get a mid range to a high end product. But to answer your question, I d do the earthy tile since you have a natural stone look in your kitchen and earthy tones in the walls and carpet, I wouldn t go dark..At least a mid tone or lighter wood flooring if you go that route. Any questions or ball park figures, e mail me through my avatar.. GL
I have hard woods and tile (bathrooms are tile). I HATE cleaning them. I do love not having any laminate in my house though! If I were to get tile again, I'd install warm floor underneath (they are cold in the winter, cool in the summer) and get a larger tile pattern so there is less grout to get dirty and need cleaning. Laminate, while not of great value for a home, is awesome if you have pets or kids and don't plan on going anywhere for a while. I would also consider hard wood sustainable options, like cork or bamboo.
Like the guy above suggested, if it was my house I would stay away from the laminate.Laminate wears quickly and can look bad fast.If your money is a little funny that may be the best way to go but if you have it I would recommend the carpet in the bedrooms tile in the baths and Hardwood in the rest of the areas.Hardwood or tile could work in the kitchen.Laminate flooring is not a good investment in the house but tile and hardwood are. I install for a living and that is the route I would go.
Go with tile. You add value to your house. Cheap laminate would only last only a few years. Laminate, in essence, is comppressed paper. If you have kids and they spill water, it could easily damage the laminate flooring. Expensive laminate could prevent this.. however they cost like $3+ per sq/ft. At that rate you might as well get the real deal and go with hardwood flooring. Last longer. Upkeep better. I'm a contractor btw.
Quality laminate is a good way to go. Although you can get a good tile for the same price as a good laminate, the tile labor per s/f is about double and you ll most likely need a backer board ( unless your on slab completely) this is about the same price for s/f as a laminate. Which makes tile up to 3xs the cost of good laminate. I personally favor tile since thats the bulk of my trade for 20 years but with that amount 0f s/f to do I d do laminate because of the ease of cleaning.Dust mopping with a spray mist ( NO mopping) is very easy. So if you have kids, dogs or don t want the extra cleaning , a good laminate is the way to go. Any questions you can e mail me through my avatar. GL
