When it comes to your home, making it your own is always a top priority. Upgrading your flooring is often on the top of the list for a homeowner wanting to change the style of their home. Let’s talk about Hard Wood Floors vs Laminate floors. There are a few pros and cons with both materials. Your flooring choice is something that will bring out your personal style in your home.
Let’s Talk About It!
Price of Hard Wood Floors vs. Laminate
When it comes to flooring, the materials will come in a wide range of price points. With that taken into consideration, it can help you determine what material best suits you.
Hardwood
- Hardwood floors are regularly a more costly option than laminated. Materials can run from $2 per square foot for unfinished oak planks , to more than $15 a square foot for pre-finished products. An unfinished floor will normally cost more than a pre-finished floor. This is due to you needing to sand the flooring on site.
- When you install hardwoods, you will normally glue, or nail the planks over your subfloor. Installation is a bigger job than most homeowners can handle, and labor costs will vary for different applications.
- Having your hardwood flooring refinished by a professional costs you between $3.00 and $5.00 per square foot. Some determining cost factors are the type of floor, finish, and treatments. When you have a hardwood floor that you can sand, it can be a great investment for your future. As your hardwood floor begins to show significant wear, you are able to make it like new again by sanding and refinishing.
- Hardwood and engineered wood give you better value when reselling if you want to get top dollar for your home, this is something you may want to take into consideration.
Laminate
- Laminate flooring is being made from composite wood that is pressed together at high temperatures. The top veneer is normally made of very durable plastics. Not only are the materials themselves cheaper, but laminate wood does not require you to use adhesive. You install a laminate over a pad, which is less than half of the cost of adhesive.
- It is also much more durable. Laminate is much more difficult for you to scratch, or stain. This makes laminate a great choice for pets, and children. Hardwoods are much more susceptible to scratching, and other types of damage.
Durability
A durable surface of Hard Wood Floors vs Laminate will make maintenance much easier, and will look great for years to come.
Hardwood
- Wood is much more susceptible to scratching, while a laminate has a very hard plastic top veneer. Hardwood is constructed of all wood, which makes them considerably more moisture resistant than the composite core of most laminates.
- Hardwood species vary in durability . Oak, hickory, and cherry are very hard woods. Walnut, birch, and pine are on the softer side of the spectrum, and will dent easier.
Laminate
- Laminates are made from pressed wood, and plastics. Laminate resists scratches, dents, and gouges. Even though laminate is more durable, it is not as visually appealing to the eye. Lower qualities of laminated wood may have artificial looking woodgrain textures.
- These products do not dent, and they are extremely resistant to scratches even if someone will try to key it. Aside from this, there are some laminates that have waterproof cores. The waterproof cores make worrying about water spills, and stains a thing of the past. You should wipe accidental spills as soon as possible, and because the veneer is plastic, staining them is virtually impossible.
- Laminate flooring can also withstand impact, and exposure to sunlight for a long period of time.
Repair
When you are in need of Hard Wood Floors vs Laminate repairs, one of these products is much easier to work with.
Hardwood
- There are two advantages of hardwoods when it comes to repairs. You can replace any number of boards without affecting other areas, and you can also have them refinished. This gives it the edge over laminate in that it will last for decades.
- The softer the wood is the easier it will be able to get scratch and receive blemishes. Hardwood floors in high traffic areas or when there are pets and children will be prone to showing damage.
Laminate
- Laminate flooring doesn’t repair as easily as wood. Due to the locking systems used in laminates, replacing a piece of flooring in the middle of the room is a large task.
- Critics say that not everyone can do laminated floorings as DIY projects. It is always best to hire a professional to install your floor. Even though the concept seems simple, the execution is very technical. Professionals follow strict industry guidelines to ensure that your flooring will not have issues as a result of improper installation.
- There can always be issues along the way. One thing that will cause you to have issues is because you install laminates with an interlocking system. When your flooring installer is not highly skilled, they can put too much pressure on the board. When too much pressure is applied it can result in curling up the veneer. If this happens, the flooring will be permanently damaged.
Your home will benefit from the look of wood flooring, but deciding whether to use hardwood or laminate is up to you.
Tip
If you have a significant amount of sunlight within your home, hardwood floors can fade. This happens because hardwood is a natural product and it reacts to UV light . Laminate wood flooring has UV protection integrated into the surface.
