subject: Choosing The Right Flooring For Your Home [print this page] A great way to build value into your home is to upgrade and remodel. Knowing which upgrades to do that will bring you the best return is the key to a successful remodeling project. One area that will always be a good investment is with your home's flooring. Nothing can change a room more than the look and feel of fresh floors through the home or even in one single room.
Deciding on a flooring upgrade is certainly a great choice but pinpointing exactly what type of flooring you may want to go with can be a little more difficult of a choice to make. There are so many choices on the market today that it can get a little confusing trying to make a final decision. A good place to start is deciding whether to go with carpet or a hard type of flooring material. Once that choice is made it will narrow down the search for the perfect floor.
There are many different grades of carpet if you are going to go that route. In recent years, the stain resistant carpets have really become the most popular choice for homeowners. Once you have the carpet installed, keeping it looking good is the rest of the battle so anything that can help is a welcome choice. Also note that most any carpenter or contractor will tell you that the carpet's best friend is quality padding underneath. So if you are going with some medium to upper grade carpet be sure not to skimp on the padding.
Another great choice of home flooring is wood floors. There are many types of wood flooring from real hardwood floors to engineered floors. Real hardwood flooring is basically one solid piece of wood. These floors can be sanded and refinished many times and if maintained well, can last for years. Engineered types of wood floors are actually layers of wood pressed together with a finished piece of wood placed on top. This type of wood floor is a cheaper alternative but they can only be sanded and refinished several times before the top piece is eventually too thin and would need replaced.
Tile floors have also been a long time favorite for kitchens and bathrooms, but more recently tile has been used for foyers and other areas of the home as well. Tile can be anything from self adhesive backed laminate square tiles to much more expensive ceramic tiles. There are other materials in between these two that are also suitable and hold up well. There are tiles that are made to look like ceramic tile but are really just a laminate type of flooring and there are also floating floors that do not get nailed or glued down.
Also becoming a popular choice and a nice feature to consider is radiant heating that can be installed under the finished floor to prevent the floor from being cold. The important factor in having a new floor installed is the sub flooring underneath. It needs to be level and professionally installed so that the finished flooring will lie correctly without any problems.
