Over the course of the past six months we had several contractors provide us with estimates and show us products for the floors. Just when we decided on a product we liked, we would be introduced to another product and would consider that. I think we started with laminate, then handscraped laminate, then bamboo, then hardwoods, then back to bamboo. It's certainly nice to have options, but sometimes they can be overwhelming!
We ultimately decided on the contractor that was recommended by a trustworthy friend. He wasn't the least expensive estimate we received, but he wasn't the most expensive either. He was patient with us and answered all our questions, was honest about what we could do ourselves, and was able to do the install in two days while we were out of town!
The hardest part was all the prep work that we did. In an effort to cut down on costs, we did the demolition and debris removal ourselves. We also rented a truck and Colin moved all the supplies into the house. We were a bit peeved that Lumber Liquidators wouldn't deliver for free after dropping so much money on 1200 sq ft of wood, molding, underlayment, and threshold. In the end, we saved about $1000 between the delivery fee, demolition fee, and debris removal fee by doing about 30 hours of work ourselves (and dealing with lots of dirt/dust).
If pulling up stone, laminate, vinyl, and carpet weren't enough, we also decided to paint the master bedroom, formal living/dining, and half bath before having the new floors installed. And did I mention we did this all in about 4-5 days, 2 of those while working full time and the other two taking up the whole weekend!?!? Thankfully, my husband is awesome and did most of the major work, and obviously all the heavy lifting. I took care of the details, like pulling up about 500 nails in the floor, painting along the baseboards and doing all the cleanup. We are a pretty good team.
Coming back from a long weekend away to new floors was amazing! It was like walking into a new house. And now that we've been in the house with the floors for about two weeks, I will definitely say they are much easier to clean. There was a fair amount of dust that needed to be cleaned when we first got back, baseboards/molding still needs to be painted, and I have no idea how to decorate with area rugs, but all-in-all, I am so glad we got the floors done. Check out the photos to see for yourself!
The formal living/dining room before
Formal living/dining after laminate removed and walls painted
Formal living/dining with new floors and walls painted
Kitchen before (with two layers of vinyl!!)
Kitchen after removing both layers of vinyl and shoe molding
Kitchen with new floors
Breakfast area before
Breakfast area, kitchen, and part of family room during demolition
Removal of carpet and underlayment in family room
reveals just how ingrained the dirt was in the flooring
Family room and kitchen with new floors
Master bedroom with carpet out, walls painted, and 61 boxes of bamboo
(Did I mention that each box is heavy and Colin brought each one in the house himself!?!?)
Master bedroom with new floors
Not only do I love the new floors, but I love the colors in the bedroom and living room. We used the darker blue paint (Sherwin Williams 6227 - Meditative) on the accent wall that's in the bedroom to also paint the half bath and it is an amazing color! The blue we picked for the master bathroom was not quite what we had in mind, but re-painting will be a project for some other time. For now, we have to find the motivation to paint the baseboards and shoe molding and touch up a few spots from this project.
BTW - Who puts carpet in bathrooms?!?! If you've ever lived with a guy (or are one), you would know that is just gross!
In case you were wondering, the floors are Morning Star Click Strand Antique Bamboo.
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