If I rip out the carpet and put down laminate flooring, I won't regret it, right?

[staceyobu]

Our house was a rental before we bought it and the previous owners put in the lowest grade options of everything. Our carpet is cheap and after three kids and a dog for the past three years, it looks bad. Plus, I hate that kids spill milk and other stuff and I don't realize it until after it has soaked in for hours.

 

I want to put in laminate wood floors. I don't know that we could afford real wood... and our house is not super nice. It's an older home in a cheaper area of town.

 

However, I've had one friend switch to laminate flooring and she hated it... said it always seemed dirty no matter how much she cleaned.

 

Should I be saving for new carpet instead? Or something else? I'm not a big fan of tile in living areas. The laminate would only go in the dining room and living room. I will probably keep carpet in the bedrooms for now... but the kids don't have food back there and the dog isn't back there as much... so it looks a lot better. We currently have carpet in the dining room! Yuck!

[KungFuPanda]

:bigear: I'm contemplating the same. Hardwood isn't in the budget and I'm wondering what the price difference is between carpet and vinyl tile.

[Twilight Woods]

we ripped our carpet out a few years ago due to DD #2 allergies. I hate them. I am planning on ripping it out and putting carpet back in some areas and tile in the high traffic areas now that DD can handle carpet.

 

The kids were helping me wash walls and one of them dumped an entire bucket of water and now the boards have warped even though I cleaned up the mess in record time.

 

I am constantly sweeping and whenever I wash them they look dirty soon after.

[funschooler5]

We ripped out our carpet about 5 years ago and put in laminate flooring...we love it! I find it SO much easier to keep clean than carpet. Just sweeping and a little Swiffering here and there. We have a wood colored laminate, and stains just do not show up.

[Desert Rat]

I've never regretted our decision to remove carpeting. I do recommend using a lighter color. It won't look dirty as much. We live in the desert and have lots of dust. I wanted dark cherry floors in our living room. My dh talked me out of it and I'm so glad he did! I would have been so annoyed with the dust!

We have an engineered bamboo in the living room and hallway. We installed it ourselves using the glue down method. It took 3 of us 10 hours to complete the job (about 500 sq ft.). Overall I would say it's a 3 out of 5 for DIY difficulty. You have to know how to use a saw and measure well.

We have put vinyl in the kitchen and in our office because it's a little room and is a pass through to the garage.

We put laminate (pergo type) flooring in the boys bedrooms. Again, we did it ourselves and that was super easy. The hardest part is measuring. :)

We have one room left, the master. They will be getting laminate in the spring.

We have wicked allergies in our family. Carpet traps so much dust, etc. It's so bad for asthma/allergies.

We used Lumber Liquidators for the laminate and the bamboo and were very happy with the price.

Get rid of that carpet!! :)

[Bootsie]

We ripped out the carpet in a previous house and put in laminate wood floors. We lived with that for about three years with no regrets. My mom did the same and was very glad she did.

[WeeBeaks]

We are slowly moving to laminate through most of the house due to allergies.

 

It is easier to keep clean IMHO. Carpet remaining here is yucky, yucky. That said you need to be massively careful to clean up spills immediately. So that milk on the carpet is bad and leaves stains, but milk on the laminate for hours could mean a warped floor. Get a good quality laminate. Some of them scratch really really easily ... think little toy trucks or the like.

 

My poor little toddler learning to walk was constantly falling and slipping on it. It is slick in socks.

 

There is no way I can keep our carpet as clean as the laminate with the number of people and traffic in here, so for us the pros outweigh the cons.

[In2why]

I can afford hard wood floors and I chose laminate. I love it! I can't imagine anyone thinking that it can't stay clean, because mine looks as good today as when I put it in 10 years ago. When my kitchen and dining room recently flooded I put laminate in the DR and tile in the kitchen.

 

Hard woods have a warmth that is wonderful, but I have half the neighborhood in the house on any given day and pets and the laminate holds up much better than the wood floors. Wood floors can scratch, and need refinishing, and for that reason I chose laminate.

 

I also think they stay cleaner better than carpets and I put inexpensive area rugs in the places I want carpet.

[Mommyof4ks]

We put down real wood floors, and I have never regretted it. If spills are an issue though, I would not go with laminate. We have never had an issue with real wood floors, not even when we did not realize we had a leaky gallon of water on the floor for a day. :glare: It was fine, but laminate would not have fared so well. In spill areas you might want to put tile there, but that is colder, so in bedrooms I would go with wood.

[JessicaLady]

I happily give you a completely different opinion!

 

We've had our 11 yrs and have never regretted them. We have them everywhere except bedrooms. They're easily maintained and you can actually get your floors clean. Not just disguised as clean like carpet. My husband and I noticed greatly reduced allergy issues once they were installed, too.

 

They've held up well when we had a pet, no dents or scratches. Even better withstand children. They've drawn on them, stuck stickers, body fluids and all cleans up.

 

HTH, J

[TravelingChris]

I think it is difficult to keep carpets clean - much easier with laminate or wood. I have some carpeting now and I hate it so much. We bought the house with the least carpeting in it- just stairs, one bedroom, one bathroom, and our storm shelter/whirlpool bath/exercise room. I hope we can rip out the carpet this spring- I hate it so much. My Gray and white cat sheds and the fur is always in the carpet.

[gardenmom5]

I ripped out my carpet and put in wood floors. we love them. hard floors (whether laminate, wood, or tile) are better for allergy sufferers because you don't have a permanent home for dust mites as you do with carpet. (and worse, the padding.)

 

think about how often carpets need to be shampooed to actually be clean . . .

 

 

eta: have a bin by the door fo shoes to cut down on the dirt on the bottom of people's feet spreading through the house.

Edited December 13, 2011 by gardenmom5

[Suzanne115]

We took out our carpet and replaced it with laminate a few years ago. We wanted hardwood, but we have dogs so we opted for laminate instead. We love it. It still looks new. I think it is much cleaner than carpet.

 

Suzanne

[Wendi]

We are very happy with our Pergo. We bought it when it was on sale at Home Depot, and dh installed it himself throughout our downstairs (except the little guest bath). Looks very nice, and it's easy to clean (I use a Shark steam mop).

 

Wendi

[akmommy]

We traded carpet for laminate after we bought this house and I hate it. It scratches easily and to me only really looks nice whe its just been mopped. I've heard bamboo is a good option but, i havent looked into cost. Have you looked into Berber carpeting? I've heard it's really easy to keep clean and stain free.

[Night Elf]

I don't regret our decision to do the same. I wouldn't trade in my laminate wood flooring for carpeting even if someone else offered to pay for it. I really like my floors.

 

Oh, we put in Trafficmaster laminate wood floors that we got from Home Depot. They are waterproof, and thank goodness for it.

Edited December 13, 2011 by Night Elf

[RoundAbout]

There are vinyl plank products that are super easy to put down and look great. Our house had this put in right before we bought and it gets tons of compliments! My DH just ripped up crappy bedroom carpeting to put in more of it. Home Depot sells some, as do many other companies.

 

It was so cheap and looks great. We are planning to go with real wood later but we may need to rent our house for a year or two and so will wait until after that to upgrade.

[AdventureMoms]

I can't imagine regretting replacing carpet with anything, unless you really love the feel and warmth of carpet. Even if you do, a large area rug can give you that same feeling on a hard-surface floor. We have mostly wood floors. We installed stick-on laminate tiles in our basement rec room last summer. Its about 300sqft, it took us about 5 or 6 hours all told. Just two of us, and one of us (DW) was 6months pregnant with twins, so she couldn't actually GET to the floor (she sat at a folding table and did all the cutting while I did all the tile-laying). We also have them in our bathroom. Those were there when we moved in, and other than the pattern (NOT what I would have chosen) we are very happy with them.

 

They look awesome. We did not get the cheapest tiles, we paid more for the thicker more resilient ones, and I think that was a good decision. They clean up super easy. Run a dust-mop over it and you're done. Maybe a damp mop or rag for spills. My aunt has had them in her kitchen and dining area for over a decade and hers still look great. An advantage of the tiles (which are available in "hardwood planks" if you want the wood look) is that if they get damaged from moving furniture or whatever, you can easily replace one tile. I've done it in the bathroom, it takes less than 10 minutes.

[StephanieZ]

I love my laminate flooring. I can't see why it would seem dirty. Mine always seems clean. :) (3 kids, 4 dogs, 4 cats . . .)

 

I have some nice carpeting, and I just wish I could convince myself that it is in bad enough shape to replace the carpeting with all laminate.

 

I love wood flooring. When our kids are grown and gone, we'll do the whole house in real wood. But, having lived with both real wood and laminate, I have to admit that laminate holds up MUCH better than wood. We've been in this house for 3 years with all these dogs and kids, and the laminate is still in PERFECT shape. Note this is high end laminate, which may hold up better than cheaper, but still, it is amazing. We've lived in two houses with brand new hard wood floors, and we had fewer dogs and kids . . . and we scratched that floor like crazy within a year. If I had real wood floors, I'd have to have them lightly sanded and resealed at least every other year. Not cheap.

[mom2denj]

st did this last year. I really thought that I was going to miss the carpet in the living room, but NOPE, I love the laminate flooring. I have to sweep a lot, but it is still worth it. It is so pretty!!! No regrets here.

[Lisbeth]

I hate carpet. Strongly. I am slowly getting rid of all carpet!

[livingnlearning]

I prefered my painted subfloor to carpet. I despise carpet and would prefer any other form of flooring.

[Denisemomof4]

some laminates scratch better than others. Do your research!

 

We checked into them to replace our maple flooring but we're going to stick with the maple. Laminates won't work in my house.

 

You won't regret them. You can't leave spills on them though. I hate carpet and can't wait for the day we finally have the energy to get our extremely heavy bedroom set moved out so we can rip out the last of the carpet.

[KungFuPanda]

SOOOO, what's the stay-new-looking, clean-looking brand we DO want? I NEED to know.

[Shellers]

We ripped out the carpets in our house about two years ago and had laminate put down. The floor looks like wood. I love it and have no regrets! I really love knowing when the floor is clean it's really clean, which wasn't the case with carpet. I would never go back to carpet.

[Starr]

I notice floors sometimes seem dirtier than carpets but you know the same dirt is just ground into the carpet. :D

I'll take the floor anytime.

[5LittleMonkeys]

We ripped all the carpet out of our house in CO. There was already laminate in the dining\living room and we were lucky enough to find a color match. However, because we were doing the entire rest of the house we went with an inexpensive brand. I hated it. The stuff in the dining\living area was much more expensive and stayed looking clean with a swiffer and a damp cloth to wipe up smudges. The cheap stuff always looked smeary and dirty no matter how much I swept or wiped it. Even when the dc walked across it with damp feet (like when their feet were a little sweaty from their shoes) every single foot print would show. It wasn't quiet as bad in the rooms that didn't have as much light...I mean the smudges were still there but you couldn't see them as much.

[happypamama]

We've got Pergo in a few rooms in our house, and while I would prefer real wood, the Pergo is very nice. We are very rough on it (spill on it, track mud/dirt/sand in on it, have kids and cats running on it constantly, etc.), and it is five years old and still looks great. Easy to sweep/vacuum, and when I do mop it, it shines beautifully. I do wipe up spills immediately, but it seems to take a lot before it's a problem.

[KatieJ]

SOOOO, what's the stay-new-looking, clean-looking brand we DO want? I NEED to know.

 

 

Mine is MoHawk brand, Carrolton is the style.

http://www.truehardwoods.com/mohawk_carrolton_laminate.html

 

When I was tryign to decide what to put in my kitchen I went to a local outlet store and asked tons of questions and he asked me just as many. They carried a style in the store that was readily available, but he suggested I go with a higher quality. A thick padding underneath makes it quieter. If you have ever walked on a laminate with a thin pad, you knew the click sound you hear when you walk. You don't hear that with mine. The pad is not on the back of the laminate, it is a pad underneath it.

 

Mine still shines like the day it was new. We have had no issues. DH put a serious scratch in it when the stove was coming out and going back in due to countertop issues. The scratch dissappeared at some point and is no longer visible to me and I know where it was.

 

I want to rip out the carpet in the living room ( right next to the dining room where the laminate is now) but DH says no. He wants carpeting for warmth for grandkids playing on the floor. I say an area rug will be fine by the sofas and the grandkids really don't care what the floor is made of. They play in the dining room and kitchen all the time.

[Down_the_Rabbit_Hole]

In our old house my husband ripped the carpet out of the soon to be nursery and laid down laminate "wood" flooring. It was wonderful. A few year later we redid the entire house with a wood flooring. No carpet made the house feel cleaner. Easy to care for. I will never go back to carpet.

[jennsmile]

Our last house had laminate thoughout the kitchen,dining, halls and livingroom. The bedrooms were a very dense and plush carpet. I miss it.

 

Our current house has stained concrete which I loathe. Yes it cleans up nice but is it a dark color and shows everything. My light laminate never showed anything. Someday when the kids are older and we have no pets we will have laminate. Until then concrete it is. I really miss carpet but I just need to get some area rugs I think.

[TXMomof4]

In our home in TX we had laminate and I loved it. It was a pecan-look and had a little texture. I think with any wood-looking product it's important to NOT get super smooth, super dark. Our house right now has this awful cherry-colored vinyl that shows every speck and hair all the time. There's no texture so everything sits right on top and catches the light. With a cat, dog and 4 kids - that's a mess!

[jenangelcat]

Carpet is gross so definitely rip it out. Just make sure your floor is completely level before installing laminate. We have to rip our laminate out because it was installed over uneven floors and it is extremely bouncy.

[In2why]

SOOOO, what's the stay-new-looking, clean-looking brand we DO want? I NEED to know.

 

 

 

I have Pergo in one room and Dupont in another. Both look really good. The Pergo is over 10 years old and still looks new. It is in the playroom and gets heavy use with skateboards, toys, and just BOYS! The only damage it suffered was when I moved the piano, it was old and the underneath had an exposed screw that scratched the floor. I used a pergo color tube of stuff (can you tell I don't know the name lol) and filled in the scratch. You can't see it unless you know where to look.

 

I think the big thing is to get a higher quality laminate. It isn't just price because you can find good sales, but you want the 8mm thickness and the ones with a long warranty. The warranty helps indicate quality.

[Spryte]

I haven't read all the replies, but I'll just throw out our experience. Laminate has been a huge help for our allergies and asthma!

 

We ripped out the carpet in our house. We did the main level first, replaced it with high end laminate. We could have bought an engineered hardwood for the same price, but really liked the look of the laminate, and the fact that it would resist scratching from our dogs' toenails. We loved it. After a year or two, it still looked brand new despite our doggies. So we replaced all the other flooring (with the exception of the kitchen and bathrooms, I'm not a fan of laminate in areas with water). We love those areas, too, it's been 2 years since we did the rest of the house - and all of our floors look brand new.

 

We did have two floods - and had the water mitigation company out each time, and had to replace two separate sections of flooring. (Yay for good insurance!) ... Both times the insurance company had to verify that our laminate was higher end, so they would reimburse us the higher price. Other than that small hassle... It was painless, and all still looks brand new.

 

Our neighbors went with a less expensive laminate in their basement - and theirs is warped and wrinkly now. I'm not sure if they had water issues, but whatever happened, it wasn't good. We wipe up spills immediately, to be safe.

 

For keeping it clean - and ours stays looking pretty darn clean, even when it's not - we use a dust mop with windex or water and vinegar. We used to use laminate floor cleaner, and then found some great advice that it's basically the above. Ok, and I do cheat on this a little bit, because we have a weekly housekeeper - who uses window cleaner on the dust mop, too. So either it stays looking clean because it doesn't show dirt, or because we're cleaning it often enough. :)

 

My one complaint is the "tick tick tick" sound when the dogs walk on it. I notice it mostly in our upstairs hallway, because it's quieter and there's less to absorb the sound.

 

Hardwood would have been wonderful, but it was out of our budget at the time, and this is not our forever house... Laminate has been a great compromise. I'd do it again in a heartbeat.

 

(Oh! And as a weird side note, we have heavy duty environmentalist friends who consider laminate a more eco-friendly option as it reduces on cutting down trees. Nice thought. Not why we chose laminate, but... food for thought.)

[Stratford]

I've not a fan of carpet and we've been slowly replacing flooring in our house over the past couple years....we're down to 2 rooms of carpeting. I vastly prefer a solid flooring. We've installed hardwood/bamboo and tile floors ourselves. I love them all.

 

I did not love laminate (we had that in our old house before we replaced it with tile and hardwood.) Perhaps ours was poor quality or installed incorrectly, but it sometimes "clicked" when you walked on it, and any moisture made the seams buckle. Very unattractive. I do know that laminate has come a long way and is better than it used to be.

 

Currently, we have tile floors (my favorite for keeping things clean, but kind of cold and hard) and bamboo in our house right now. When we had a flood and needed to replace carpet, the cost of having 3 rooms of carpet installed was more expensive than installing bamboo floors ourselves. We choose bamboo for the bedrooms and have been very happy with it. They are lighter in color, so dust doesn't show (which was a big issue with our old brazilian cherry floors.) No scratches at this point except where I had an accident with dropping a hammer while standing on a ladder. I do have 3 extremely active boys but no pets.

[Cinder]

We didn't regret it. But then we *had* to rip out the carpet. It was old and smelly--the previous owner was a smoker. Dh then had to seal the subfloor with polyurethane before he could install the laminate flooring. We did laminate in the living room, kitchen and dining. The bedrooms got carpet; bathrooms were vinyl.

 

Laminate flooring might appear dirtier because the dirt sits on top. Carpet captures the dirt and holds it in. You can easily run a dust mop/swiffer through the room to collect the dust.