We often find homeowners in a Catch-22 when they need new flooring: it seems like an expensive investment, but they’re (understandably) afraid to go cheap now only to regret it later. So, the decision gets put off altogether – which can lead to a few problems of its own. Fortunately, you don’t always have to sacrifice value in order to save money. Here, we’ll take a quick look at a few tips that can help you find the perfect balance.
The Best Choice For Carpet – And Its Top Alternative
Without a doubt, nylon excels as the material of choice for carpet fibers. It’s more durable, more stain resistant – and more expensive. Since nylon is the most popular choice for flooring material, its demand tends to drive the price even higher. Fortunately, there’s another carpet material that also performs well at a much lower cost: polyester.
Polyester carpet ranks high on the same measures used to test nylon, including stain resistance, ease of cleaning, durability and available styles. This may come as a surprise, since polyester carpet once had a bad reputation for being poorly engineered. However, modern selections continue to outperform almost every other fiber material and even often rivals nylon. Even better, it costs much less than nylon, sometimes available at half the price!
Laminate: A Viable Hard Surface Alternative
Laminate flooring has been trending lately, and it’s easy to see why. Laminate offers some of the largest style ranges of any flooring type. This is largely because it can be designed to perfectly replicate the look and texture of any hard surface flooring, whether that be hardwood or stone.
So why not just choose an original to begin with? Laminate is also much more affordable than its authentic counterparts. Yet despite costing less, it performs just as well, and sometimes even better! For example, laminate’s water resistance consistently outperforms that of stone flooring. It’s also much easier to care for. So, to sum it all up, you’re saving money without sacrificing quality.
Installation
It can be a scary thought to hire a cheap floor installer, but there are ways to save on professional services. Newer installation methods take less time and are easier to complete, thus saving money without skimping on quality. Floating installation is a great example, as it (in many cases) allows new flooring to be installed over the existing flooring. Even better, click floating installation is often easy enough to be installed with any prior knowledge or expertise – in other words, it’s a DIY-friendly option that eliminates installation costs altogether.
Why Flooring Replacements Are Needed – And Solutions To Avoid It
To save money in the long-term, try to find out specifically why your old flooring failed and find out if your new choice is designed to overcome that problem. Here’s a quick look at how old flooring fails and how new flooring can help:
Carpet crushing – In high-traffic areas, older carpet fibers crush over time, leaving an obvious imprint. Many newer fibers are designed to resist crushing, allowing carpet to remain uniform for many years ahead. Still, if crush-resistant carpet is outside of your budget, you may want to consider a matching area rug.
Moisture – Spills, stains and even humidity can degrade both hard and soft surface flooring. Even worse, moisture often becomes embedded in the subfloor, making it difficult to detect until expensive repairs are needed. Fortunately, there are many carpet and hard surface options that are designed to resist or even completely repel moisture. We even offer entire selections in our Waterproof Flooring Destination displays.
Warping – Hardwood flooring has, throughout its history, been subject to warping. It’s often subtle at first, with small shifts occurring during seasonal changes. But over time, this warping can cause problems for both the subfloor and the home itself. Engineered hardwood is designed to prevent this. Even better, it often costs less to install. To learn more, we devoted a previous post to the differences between engineered and solid hardwood.
To learn more about budget-friendly flooring, or to browse the many selections available, stop by Cleveland Carpets in Griffin today!
