Hardwood floors on second floor, is this a bad idea?

[Splash]

We need to put down new flooring in the bedrooms and hallway upstairs.  Our daughters are asking if we could put down hardwood instead of carpet.  Our family has lots and lots of allergies along with some asthma.  We have four kids still living at home 11 through 19 yrs old, two Portuguese Water Dogs and a cat.  Downstairs is all hardwood and tile.  I'm looking at hardwood, bamboo and cork.  Any input.  Would it be awful to put something other than carpet upstairs?  What is your experience?  Way too loud and you regret it. Or wonderful and easy to keep clean.    Also of hardwood, bamboo or cork, which would you recommend.

 

 

Thanks,

Kimberly

[zoobie]

We love having hardwood upstairs. It's been great for allergies and is so easy to keep clean. I have tile in the master bathroom and LVP in the other baths. Pretty much only the kids and cats come upstairs.

[GreenKitty]

I don't think it would be awful to put hardwood floors upstairs. It's a great idea and easy to clean! You can always put down a few throw rugs where you think it would be loud. I prefer hardwood over the other options. Good luck!

[Selkie]

I vote wonderful. We have hardwood floors on all three floors of our house and like them a lot. We have three kids and multiple dogs and cats and our wood floors aren't noisy at all.  

 

I hate carpet and find hardwood to be so much easier to keep clean. Plus, my dh and kids have allergies and one used to have asthma (he has since outgrown it) and the wood floors have helped with that tremendously.

 

 

[SparklyUnicorn]

We live in a 2 family (with three floors).  There is hardwood (and some laminate) on every floor.  It's not extra noisy. 

[My4arrows]

We have hardwood in a few bedrooms upstairs and love it. It has helped with allergies and cleaning. Our master is downstairs so we have noticed a bit more noise but really not much since we have four active boys living above us.

[Annie G]

Hardwood in bedrooms is great! No regrets here. 

[Butter]

I'm a big fan of hard floors for many reasons.  We're in the process of getting rid of all the carpets in our house.  It was only in the bedrooms to begin with.

[MEmama]

I think all the houses I've lived in since leaving home at 18 have had hardwood throughout. It's my favorite, for sure. Why would it be weird?

 

We do have one upstairs room that has carpet. It is now stained. 😠

[elegantlion]

I despise carpet. We have hardwoods (original 1889) in half of the bedrooms upstairs. My mom's bedroom has nice new carpet which she likes in a bedroom. I really prefer hardwoods throughout a home, less allergens, easier to clean and keep clean, etc. 

[mom@shiloh]

We have wood on all three floors of our house and I would never consider putting carpet in instead.  I've pulled up enough carpet and I know what it looks like underneath.  Yuck, yuck, yuck.

[Carol in Cal.]

I have allergies, and would never put carpet in a bedroom.  I love hardwood, and when we got out cabin we ripped out the old wall to wall carpet and put in Brazilian cherry hardwood in most of the upstairs.  (One small room has hickory, and the bathroom has some kind of vinyl tile.)  We love that cherry floor--it is beautiful and it's easy to clean.  Maple, oak, walnut and cherry are the really hard woods for floors.  Pine and fir are much softer.  Which is too bad--there is a new pine flooring on the market that has blue/grey streaks on a glowing yellowish tan background that I think is just gorgeous.  It's cut from pine trees that have been killed by bark beetle infestations.  But it's pretty soft.  I might put it in an office or guest room that isn't used much, but not in a main room with daily use.

 

My brother had cork tile in his bedroom when we were kids.  That felt a little warmer than wood underfoot, and it looked nice.

 

I have heard that bamboo dents easily.

[PeterPan]

We have hardwood on our main floor with a full, live-in basement underneath. The one trick that happens that they wanted us to watch for is the difference in humidity between the levels. We ended up putting a vapor barrier between the floors on the advice of the very trusted flooring person. But that's something you could just ask them about. It would be the only snaffu I can think of.

 

In general, yes, love hardwood. I put down area rugs for my kids in their rooms, but I don't have them in mine or the guest. 

 

Hardwood is going to have cracks that catch the dander. Best thing, BEST THING I ever did for my allergies and asthma was getting a ROOMBA. Buy one and run that baby frequently!! Love the Roomba.

[bettyandbob]

My upstairs is all hardwood. It's great.

[JIN MOUSA]

Another vote for hardwoods upstairs. We just did it in a whole second floor renovation, and it doesn't seem especially loud. One thing you can also look at is a sound-dampening underlay. Depending on what kind of flooring you get and what you're laying it on top of, you may need an underlay anyways.

[Harriet Vane]

We loooooove hardwood and are glad to have it on all floors of the house. 

[lavender's green]

I long for the day when I can replace the upstairs carpet with hardwood. I'm so grossed out by it, but try not to think about it. Just...all those little strands, catching every bit of dust, dirt, and dander, not to mention kid and pet stains that probably linger even though they look clean.

 

You just might consider doing something about the stairs. I once slipped on some tracked-in slush on tile stairs, and got a spectacular series of evenly-spaced horizontal bruises on the entire back of my body.

[G5052]

We love hardwood, and all but the kitchen and baths have it (they have tile).

 

We opted for carpeted stairs even though I'm not fond of it. Hardwood stairs can be loud and slippery. The carpet is quiet and easy to navigate. 

[Splash]

Thanks, hubby is convinced this is what we're going to do.  Thank you.  We already have a wood staircase, did that when we moved in but decided to carpet the upstairs.  Now 12 yrs later it's time for a change.  I'm glad to hear no one regrets having hardwood upstairs.  I have tile in the kitchen, laundry, powder room and mud  room.  Hardwood everywhere else downstairs. I was afraid it would make upstairs loud and colder. Not sure about the long hallway yet, think we'll just tackle one bedroom at a time.  All the bathrooms already have tile so that helps.

 

[Tanaqui]

As far as I'm concerned, built in carpeting is gross. It never, ever seems to get clean. Wood floors and buy area rugs if you feel the need for those. Hardwood is traditional, anyway.

[Tanaqui]

I was afraid it would make upstairs loud and colder.

 

Shouldn't be a problem if you adequately insulate the space between the floor and the ceiling below. Also - area rugs will muffle noise in high-traffic areas.

 

[Guest]

Hardwood, tile, or concrete with rugs. Amen.

[happypamama]

My ILs have all hard floors upstairs. It's very nice. Not too loud at all. They do have a big rug in one room.

 

I would go for hard floors upstairs in my house in a heartbeat, but since it's an old house, dh thinks we probably need carpet for insulation.

[Pam in CT]

We have hardwood throughout the house, upstairs and downstairs, everywhere except the kitchen and bathrooms.  It's not loud, and we have area rugs next to the beds so we step down onto fluffy warmth.

 

I did end up putting in heavily-insulating pad and super-thick carpet on top of the hardwood in the two upstairs rooms over the garage.  That was for warmth, though, not because I was unhappy with the hardwood.

[UmMusa]

Ack! My entire upstairs is carpet and now I'm grossed out after reading all this!

[slackermom]

I have lived in a bunch of different apartments and houses with hardwood floors, and there is much less of an issue with upstairs noise from wood floors in a single family house. In apartment buildings, I sometimes hear people walking around on their wood floors above us when they are wearing high heels/boots/dress shoes, especially when they are on their way in or out for the evening. In a single family home, heavy shoes really don't often make it to the upstairs floors.

 

I do have an Irish dancer, and when we lived in a second floor apartment we had to make a rule of no dancing in the kitchen (which was tile), even in socks, because it made the downstairs neighbor's chandelier swing back and forth, but I never got complaints about dancing in the other rooms with wood floors.

[madteaparty]

I hate nailed down carpet and therefore am saving in order to rip out relatively new carpet upstairs (came with the house). This goes with some other renovations so

I'm waiting a little, miserably. If it was just the carpet it would have been ripped out right after closing!

[gardenmom5]

we have hardwood and tile on the bedroom level.  dudeling has carpet in his room (the only carpet in the entire house) because he wanted it.  it will get hardwood one day.

 

i love it, and have no regrets.

[catz]

He have hardwood upstairs in bedrooms and a hall. It's great!

[StephanieZ]

I am still thankful every day that we got rid of every inch of carpeting in our remodel a couple years ago. 

 

I love, love, love having a no carpet house.

 

Go for it. You'll love it.