New flooring that doesn't break the bank?

[MandyT]

Our house has engineered flooring in most of the  downstairs and builder grade, oatmeal colored carpet upstairs and also in a couple of the rooms downstairs. I'm not a big fan of the hard flooring downstairs because it's very dark and shows dirt and pet hair very easily. It's also pretty beat up from the previous owner's dogs.

The carpeting is original to the house, so about 12 years old. I keep it in decent shape with frequent steam vacuuming. However, I dislike carpeting. It's a pain in the butt to keep clean with pets, and in general I'm not fond of the look. I probably wouldn't mind one of those fancy low pile carpets, truthfully, but we have three cats and it seems like the type of texture they would love to use as a scratching post. :-)

I've been looking into prices to get new engineered hardwood installed. Our neighbor had it done and it cost $14,000... and that includes a small discount they got for ripping up the old flooring themselves! There is a place called something like lumber liquidators that is less expensive but still pretty pricey.

I don't feel comfortable installing flooring myself, and DH has zero interest in doing it with me.

So my question is: what are some other options for flooring that are attractive and less expensive than getting engineered hardwood installed...but still not carpet?

I was thinking that maybe I could paint the engineered hardwood downstairs, and then tear up the carpets upstairs, figure out what kind of hard flooring would be cheapest, and paint that to match. (or even figure out a way to paint the underlayment if that makes sense.) I'm actually painting and stenciling right over the tile in one of our  bathrooms and it's coming out great (see photo). I know that doing a whole house full of flooring would be way, way more time-consuming but that's OK with me. I just don't know if it's a feasible plan in general.

Anyone here done anything really creative in terms of flooring? is there actually a style of carpet that is prettier than the basic builder grade stuff that is good for people with pets? I would love your ideas, thanks!

[Dicey]

We are huge fans of LVP. We bought what we needed for our current project via Craigslist for $2/sf.

[MandyT]

Oh yes, @Dicey I forgot that an interior designer friend of mine recommended LVP! I was skeptical because we had it installed in our old house when we turned the garage into a game room, and it looked like the kind of thing you would install in a garage. But apparently the designs are much nicer now. It sounds like you installed it yourself? Definitely not going to be happening here :-)

[roomtempmayo]

I've lived in several houses with 100+ year old hardwood floors.  I'm sure they'd been refinished many times, and all looked and functioned great.

Most vinyl seems to get tossed after 10 years, and I don't know if that's due to fashion or wear.

Just put down proper hardwood and be done with it.  The world doesn't need any extra plastic.

[Paper Chaser]

The benefits of LVP mostly have to do with ease of installation, and durability. The price per sqft of decent quality LVP can easily rival engineered hardwood. If you're not going to be installing it, the ease of installation doesn't really matter much so it just comes down to whether the durability is worth it, and if you find the plastic nature of it to be a benefit or drawback.

[MandyT]

Thanks! I don't love plastic. In NH we lived in a 100-year-old house, and we ripped up the carpets and had the beautiful hardwood underneath refinished. Now we're in a cheaply built 12-year-old house that I think will literally not last 100 years...and we're planning to downsize eventually. So I'm fine with LVP if I can find one I like.

[innkeeper77]

Thanks! I don't love plastic. In NH we lived in a 100-year-old house, and we ripped up the carpets and had the beautiful hardwood underneath refinished. Now we're in a cheaply built 12-year-old house that I think will literally not last 100 years...and we're planning to downsize eventually. So I'm fine with LVP if I can find one I like.

What is wrong with it that it will not last 100 years? I own a cheaply built house from the 70's.... tons of problems, but those problems are always relatively cheap to fix when updating other things. It is already 50 years old and I am very confident that outside of a disaster it will have no problem going another 50+ years before it is uneconomical to repair.

[MandyT]

I don't know, it just feels… Not sturdy. Hollow plastic doors, etc. I may be exaggerating, but the main point is that I don't want to put really, really good floors in a house like this.

[SweatingInAR]

Thanks! I don't love plastic. In NH we lived in a 100-year-old house, and we ripped up the carpets and had the beautiful hardwood underneath refinished. Now we're in a cheaply built 12-year-old house that I think will literally not last 100 years...and we're planning to downsize eventually. So I'm fine with LVP if I can find one I like.

LVP is great. Find a local flooring store that sells and installs A LOT of it. They will have a few colors and designs that they install by the truckload into offices, stores, hospitals and other high-traffic buildings. It might take a few calls, though. Some stores will try to tell you "nobody buys that stuff" or "we'll have to special order it, and our supplier only has click together". The right store will tell you "of course, we install 10,000 sf of glue down vinyl planks per week". If they don't have installers on staff, they will refer you to one.

Around 2016 I could get it including installation for less than $3 per sf, and the pair of installers did my 500sf area in one day! I had already done most of a kitchen remodel by myself and was struggling to buy the materials alone for less than $2/sf.

2021 it was a little over $4/sf.

[onward19]

Painted floors will not last. At all. It's paint. It will scuff and flake and chip. Paint just does not work well on horizontal surfaces, especially heavy use like a floor.

 We bought LVP. High quality rigidcore. We tore up our existing 80s flooring and went to lay the flooring.......no end of problems. Leveling an old floor to be flat enough for LVP.....nightmare. Now if you already have existing engineered then it's possible they leveled the floors adequately and you would have no issues. Our issue, to be clear, is not the LVP itself. But older houses the joists and etc are not easy to get level and LVP is a floating floor so it has to be level. It is possible that other types of LVP that are glue down don't have the same issues with leveling, but I haven't looked into those.

[Sibley]

I have LVP in the kitchen, and I am grudgingly impressed with the sheer amount of abuse its taken and still looks decent. I still think the stuff is hideous and it's poorly installed, but it has worn like iron.

[sonofsven]

LVP has pretty much taken over the flooring industry, I've installed it (floating) in the last four houses I built. I run it continuous from one end of the house to the other, no transistions at doorways, even in the bathroom, right up to the tub/shower. The last brand I used was Cor-tech, it has a cork backing. I'd have to check on the price/sq ft.
I have real wood in my own house, for what it's worth.

[iris lily]

I don't know, it just feels… Not sturdy. Hollow plastic doors, etc. I may be exaggerating, but the main point is that I don't want to put really, really good floors in a house like this.

I was thinking to myself oh please no more LVP until I read it it’s going in your house as you described it. And now, I think LVP would  be appropriate material for your house I like matching materials to the structure.

Not a fan here of LVP but in some circumstances… Yep

[MandyT]

Thanks for all the interesting takes!

If we do go ahead with it, I'll be sure to look for a local company with a lot of experience. I think/hope there wouldn't need to be a lot of work in terms of leveling the floor since we already have engineered hardwood downstairs. Looks like these days you can get nice-looking LVP flooring for $3/sf.

I agree with matching the flooring to the house! While I would love to have nice hardwood floors, I wouldn't want to spend $$$ installing it in a house that doesn't "deserve" it.

And after all this...part of me is saying, "Just suck it up, throw down some area rugs to modernize the carpet a bit and we'll be out of here in 5-6 years." :) Though I wonder how 20+ year-old carpet affects the salability of a home. I'd wager not too much.

[lutorm]

FWIW, we're replacing the carpet in our bedroom (only carpet in house, the rest has CVG Douglas fir) and I was like "let's look at this LVP everyone's talking about" and I was extremely disappointed. I don't doubt it's durable, but it looks exactly like plastic that someone's tried to make look like wood, with fake texture that no real wood floor has and an ugly, plasticy sheen. And it's not even cheaper than wood!

We went with engineered bamboo instead. It was a little more expensive, but not that much, and it looks awesome and is also supposed to be very durable. (It's certainly going to be more durable than the very soft Douglas fir.)

It does sound like that would be out of place in your place as you describe it, though.

[monarda]

We are deciding between sheet vinyl and a LVP product that's available either as a floating floor (click lock) or a glue down product. This is for kitchen and baths at our rental.

@Dicey or others, is there a good reason to go one way or the other?  We'll get the final prices tomorrow, but the 'medium' thickness sheet vinyl is $5.50/sf installed, and the click lock is $4.70/sf for material and we'd need to install. Don't know the glue-down product price installed or not (will find out tomorrow), but the material is thinner than the click-lock, which I think is a good thing.
The wear layers are the same, as far as I can tell. 20 mil.

[MandyT]

@lutorm Thanks for sharing your experience! Funny, I was just asking my SIL what they had installed and she told me it was engineered bamboo...and that it was pretty close in price to LVP. So I was going to look into that.

I think what I like about LVP is that it's supposed to be very scratch-resistant. The engineered wood we have right now is all scratched and dented, which is annoying.

I'll need to check out some LVP IRL to see if I have the same reaction. I have a friend who's a very good interior designer and she tells me that it looks very good! I guess beauty is in the eye and all that. :)

[Hula Hoop]

Here in Italy, everyone has tile floors everywhere in their houses.  Our apartment building was built in the 19th century and we have the original tiles in our apartment and they still look great.  Tiles extremely durable, look good and are nice and cool in summer.  People here consider wall to wall carpets to be unsanitary and I agree.  Hard wood floors are also a thing here nowadays but they're less durable than tiles.

Anyway not sure where you're located but even if I moved to another country, if I had to put in new flooring I'd choose tiles.

[MandyT]

Here in Italy, everyone has tile floors everywhere in their houses.  Our apartment building was built in the 19th century and we have the original tiles in our apartment and they still look great.  Tiles extremely durable, look good and are nice and cool in summer.  People here consider wall to wall carpets to be unsanitary and I agree.  Hard wood floors are also a thing here nowadays but they're less durable than tiles.

Anyway not sure where you're located but even if I moved to another country, if I had to put in new flooring I'd choose tiles.

@Hula Hoop I love tile! However, they're not really a thing where I am—outside the bathroom and kitchen, that is—so I think it would impact our ability to easily sell the house when we downsize. Also, we have a pretty large house with an open plan, so tile might be, as Tim Gunn always put it, "A lotta look." :D But I agree, they look amazing and wear well.

[Hula Hoop]

That's a shame.  Tiles don't have to be "a lotta look" but if floor tiles aren't a thing where you are then I agree it could affect resale value.  And the whole point of tiles is that they last forever so having someone rip them out if they buy your place would delete the environmental and mustachian values of tiles.