The floors are in now, and we’re in the process of pulling our home (and lives) back together. Since we spent over two years agonizing over the hows and whens and whats of this ambitious adventure, I thought I’d pass along a few things we learned along the way.
1. All flooring stores are not created equally. We encountered quite the variety of idiocy: refusals to allow samples out of the store, demands that we sign contracts before measuring for pricing, radical cost differences, extreme ignorance and/or lies… it was downright discouraging. In the end, though, the company we selected lived up to every expectation we had, so if you’re considering a floor remodel in the Katy / West Houston area, feel free to contact me privately. I’ll gladly share both recommendations and warnings.
2. Concrete floors and no furniture equal astounding echoes. Also: even a modestly-sized home will seem enormous when empty. Ours seemed (and is) ridiculously vast.
3. The slightest signs of progress will inspire extreme euphoria. Try to stay out of the way, or the work will stall.
4. Hardwood floors absorb sound. This one was a complete surprise to me.
5. When you start putting everything back, you’ll discover any number of items you’d either forgotten you owned, or can’t remember why you had them. You may also decide that it’s past time to get your home set up in a way that makes sense. If you’re three weeks away from a major event (like Christmas), try to resist the temptation.
6. Edited to add: Installing hardwood floors requires an abrupt, and somewhat uninspiring but necessary, focus on the feet of all your furniture. I recommend the felt investment before, rather than after, since it’s pretty frustrating to get the first major scratch before the last board is laid. (Guess how I know this…)
We’re putting up decorations (and hopefully a tree!!) tonight. I’ll post a pretty picture tomorrow.
We did our floors last year. They started on Monday, we had our family Christmas party Saturday. Due to a few strange not in the contractors control problems they were not finished Thursday night. He promised he would be finished Friday night. He was at ten PM. He had to bring in an extra crew to finish moving furniture back. Bonus is I not longer snore
Bwahahahahaha! And I thought our schedule was ambitious! LOL!!! I’m sure all my hair would have gone snow white and/or fallen right out if I’d had a major party scheduled for this past weekend. (OTOH, we’re thinking of having a bash between Christmas and New Year’s, in part so we can prove we actually survived this…)
Re: snoring. Yes, we’re looking forward to the reduced dust and ickiness in the carpets.