Hardwood Floor Refinishing or New Hardwood Floor Installation?

If you want to improve the appearance of an old wooden floor, the first thing you should decide is if you want to have the opportunity to make hardwood floor refinishing or install a new one. To help you understand which will be better, and help you make the right choice, I’ll try to explain in this article.

What is hardwood floor refinishing? This is when a layer of varnish and the top layer of hardwood are cut off with special machines, and new layers of lacquer are placed on a clean surface. If you want to change the color of your floor, then before you apply the first coat of varnish, apply a stain – a special paint for wood. On how to choose the right color of stain, I’ll discuss in a future article.

As a rule, work removing the top layer of hardwood is very dusty, so it is very important in choosing which tools you are going to use on your floor. And yet, in any case, to avoid dust, try to remove all the furniture and other items from the room, or carefully cover them with poly.

If the floor has boards with serious injuries, they can simply be replaced with new ones before you begin the cutting process of the upper layer. Thus, you can completely change the look of the flooring, even the color.

Of course, hardwood floor refinishing and replacement of damaged boards is not cheap. If you advise someone to remove the old floor and install a new one, then before you do this, first calculate how much it will cost for both projects, and then make a final decision.

So now you know what is involved in hardwood floor refinishing, and if this work is a very expensive, problematic and long. Now you can determine what you have to do and what you need to invest in order to install new hardwood.

First, you need to remove the old hardwood which does not meet your requirements. This work costs money, and I confess that it is not cheap. I purposely do not mention the cost of work in this article, as in all countries and cities it is different.

Secondly, if you really want to enjoy the new flooring, you will need to make a leveling before installing the new hardwood. Your previous owner might have been be a great miser, and decided to save by ordering poor leveling or did not do it at all. This work (making a leveling) also costs money.

Third, you will need to invest in new material, as well as pay for its installation. This is good if you choose to stay with the prefinished hardwood floor. If you want to install unfinished material, you have to go back to the beginning of this article and read everything that was written for hardwood floor refinishing, before you can begin for this process.

If my friends or clients need to choose between hardwood floor refinishing and new floor installation, I advise them to renovate the old flooring and then I find a good sander guy for them. I usually do it myself, though I could very well make money on this project.