And why?
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We chose laminate because this isn't out forever home and never would have seen ROI in this neighborhood.
Otherwise, hardwood for sure.
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Laminate. DH is in flooring and laminate has come a long way. With kids and a dog it doesn't make sense to do hardwood imo. Hardwood would get get scratched up like craaazyy whereas our shitty laminate in our old house barely saw a scratch with a dog for 5 years. Currently in our forever home we have a top of the line laminate and we've been here almost two years. It's withstand a toddler dropping toys on it, dragging chairs across the room and me dropping a knife a few times.
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Laminate for sure. Hardwood is gorgeous but has to be refinished every few years. It's just more maintenance than I want to deal with
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I agree with @locavore_mama: If we didn't have kids or our kids were grown we'd choose hardwoods. But with LOs (to me at least) laminate is more practical.
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We have laminate that looks like hardwood and I actually really like it. Pretty durable, fairly easy to clean, we have a dog and stroller and furniture getting dragged and a crib on wheels... holding up really well. I just hate it when hardwood looks nasty... I have seen some scary hardwood floors! But laminate isn't perfect either there is some buckling from moisture by the patio door.
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@locavore_mama: interesting! I think I am going to get estimates this week.
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@Greentea: that might be a installation issue. We had laminate by our 6' patio doors and never had buckling issues. We live up north where we get pretty snowy winters!
Not saying that laminate is perfect!
I think most people disregard laminate as cheap and low quality just on reputation and not being informed! -
We have hardwoods and I love them. They are the original floors from 1959 and have not been refinished. They are in great shape. That being said, if I were installing them myself I might be tempted to go with laminate because of the price.
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I think I will get laminate or wood grain tile!
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Laminate. With 2 dogs it was no question. Hardwood now is mostly engineered meaning you can't refinish it. ( the ones in the bottom to middle price range anyways) so we bought a top of the line laminate that is wide plank and distressed. We live it and constantly get comments about it!!
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@mrs. 64: jealous! The only time I want hardwood is if they were original to the home.
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We just bought a house that has hardwood in almost every room, and that's something we were looking for. Better resale value (if you maintain it well), and I'm very focused on minimizing the chemicals in our home these days. Since laminate can have voc's and formaldehyde and that sort of thing, we tried to avoid it. There's still some in the dining room and laundry room, but we'll replace it eventually. It's older, so at least most of the off-gassing has already happened, and the risks are lower.
And yeah, I know I can't avoid chemicals everywhere, but since we prefer the look of hardwoods anyway, it was an easy way to cut back on them just a bit more. We'll have to do some research on safely refinishing them when the time comes though.
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@locavore_mama: interesting! (Re: installation)
We has large (very wide) pine board wood floors in a log home and they were amazing. So I think it depends on the quality...
We also had large natural stone flooring (large slates basically of natural stone). It held up, was high quality and very cool, but cost a fortune and was not ideal for a lo!
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@Torchwood: that is a concern for me as well. The new laminate (some companies) have low vocs but still... so hard to "win!"
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@Greentea: Yeah, it's so frustrating! I'm ocd about things, so if I want to eliminate chemicals, I want to eliminate ALL chemicals. But that is literally impossible in any sort of modern home. Oy.
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@locavore_mama: my dad has been in the industry for 30 years and wholeheartedly disagrees.
My personal experience (I worked for his company for 10 years) is that it's ultimately going to depend on the quality of the hardwood vs the quality of the laminate. We did *not* put top of the line laminate in our home (again, not a forever home!) and it does scratch. Not from the cats, whose claws are intact, but we've dropped keys and a screw driver. Oops!
The advantage is the board can be replaced. Probably a pita to do, but doable. With hardwood, you'll need to sand the scratch then restain.
@Torchwood: bona products are green & you should be able to find a professional who can dustless sand the floor.
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I'm in the hardwood camp. Engineered or traditional. I haven't seen a laminate I've liked yet and I look at flooring weekly.
We have hardwoods with a dog, two cats, and a toddler and haven't had any problems. -
We put in a gorgeous laminate a couple of months ago. We've dropped stuff on it, brought in and moved furniture around, my large dog runs and slides around on it and drops her toys, etc., and no scratches so far!
My parents spent a small fortune putting hardwood in their home, and it got scratched up from the dogs within a matter of days. I am too type A for flooring that is so easily scratched!
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We chose man made hardwood. So it has a layer of wood over a composite back.
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I'm really not picky, but there is hardwood in our kitchen (carpet everywhere else) so we will most likely put hardwood in the common areas and replace carpet in the bedrooms.
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Our laminate is gorgeous but shows EVERY little scratch. We have to put booties on our dog because he destroys them. They are really dark though, so maybe that's the problem?
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Some of the new wood grain tile I've seen looks great. I am considering that for when we re-do our kitchen floors.
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Hardwood no question. Laminate is so cheap and ugly looking. We have both and will get rid of the laminate as soon as we can afford to.
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Hardwood has better resale value here. In main living areas laminate is better than carpet and hardwood is better than laminate.
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Hardwood, definitely. Laminate just wouldn't look right in a house from the 1800's
In my opinion, of course.
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@mrs. 64: our house was built in 1958 and I can't believe it doesn't have original hardwoods! There's only plywood under the carpet. Gr!
Wow, this will be a hard decision!
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We have hardwood floors and I love them. They were original to the house but we had them refinished when we bought the house. Upkeep hasn't been difficult so far. I think it gives a warmth to the house.
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@skipra: "Laminate is so cheap and ugly looking" - ouch! Tell us how you really feel
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@skipra: there are laminate out there that's "hand scraped" and just as expensive as some mid grade hardwood. You'll be surprised when you go shopping at a higher end flooring store!
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We have hardwood and it does get stressful but I'm not sure laminate would fly in our area. I am considering it for the laundry room though.
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We have hardwood original to our house. It is 50 years old, but freshly refinished. We are easy on our floors ( no pets, no shoes in the house, area rugs).
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Hardwood, all the way, but I think it would depend on my house, potential resale value, etc. We had an older house that we needed new flooring in - it would not have made sense to put in hardwood b/c we would have never seen a return on it when we sold it. We installed a mid-grade laminate and it looked *alright*, not great.
Our current home is all hardwood. Laminate would not work in this neighborhood. It does suck that it gets scratched and dinged up easily. I just try not to stare at the scratches too much
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@PermaStudent: @locavore_mama: sorry, that was a little harsh! All the laminate I've seen is awful including what's in our house. I'm sure there is nicer stuff out there but if it costs as much as hardwood why would you get it? That's actually a real question because I don't know how it is superior to hardwood. It is very uncommon in my area and seen as something to be fixed (as witnessed during our recent house hunt) .
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We chose hardwood for our forever home. With the right deal it's not so much more than good laminate! Personally I don't really dare that much (as long as it looks good haha) but DH is adamant on it. In bathrooms, kitchen and basement we have tiles. Our basement floor looks like hardwood tho! It's crazy what they can do these days.
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I think a lot depends on where you live...like in New England I love hardwoods, but where we live now we have a combination of tile/stone and laminate and the tile is much easier to clean with the kids. Also some of the laminate has like air bubbles or something underneath so I'm not a fan.
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So glad you asked. I'm wondering this myself. I need to replace the carpet in my living room, but not sure which to get. I'm leaning towards laminate though.
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Hardwood for our entry and 2nd level.
Laminate and carpet for our finished basement. -
We have laminate in our living room and bedroom. Its nice laminate though...and was here when we bought the house.
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Hardwood for sure, but laminate for the basement.
@pinkcupcake: I agree that it depends on the neighbourhood. Most of the houses in our neighbourhood have hardwood floors. We had original flooring but when we went to refinish the main floor there were major issues that we just decided to get new flooring. Even though it's not our forever home, we just didn't want to do laminate. I personally dislike it when i'm looking at high end homes that choose to use laminate.
In my opinion, of course.
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