Buying Flooring - Have You Considered Laminates?
Kurt J Schefken
Hardwood floors are beautiful, but, as everyone knows,
expensive. A lovely and less expensive alternative is laminate
flooring. Laminate comes in a wide variety of both colors and
styles, and you can find a laminate to suit any budget. They
look just like hardwood floors and are now manufactured by such
reliable forums as Mohawk and Shaw, so you know you Will have
good quality.
There is a wide range of choices in laminate flooring,
something to suit every room in the house and every house in
the neighborhood. No matter what the style of the room, there
is a laminate that will suit it. There are floorings that
resemble Early American plank boarding and there is flooring
that is super modern in look.
Most of the laminates today are made to look like wood, but
there are other options as well. Laminates are available in
styles that resemble tile, stone or marble as well. Using all
laminate floorings througout your home, you can have the look
of ceramic tile in kitchens and bathrooms, the look of wood in
living room and family room and the look of marble in the
foyer.
When you begin to shop for laminates, measure the area you want
to cover. Then allow 10% for waste and pattern matching. With
these numbers in hand, you will be able to price your flooring
project realistically.
There are many sites on the Internet where you can shop for
discount flooring. These sites have excellent pictures so that
you can see exactly what you are going to get. The most
important thing when you order on line is that you get all the
material from the same lot, so there will be no differences in
the material. If all of the material is not from the same lot,
you will notice variations in color and textures once the
flooring is laid.
Make sure you check the flooring immediately upon arrival for
any damage or faults. Make sure there is no chipping or other
damage along the edges. Insist on an exchange if there is any
damage that cannot be trimmed away without affecting the use of
the flooring.
It is a fairly easy project to install laminate flooring, and
most handy do it yourselfers can do it. The prep is easy, since
laminate can be installed right over existing flooring, whether
that flooring is vinyl, hardwood, wood or concretes. Laminate
has been successfully installed over concrete in basements.
Laminate flooring comes in pieces that are fitted together in a
tongue and groove method. It is not glued or nailed in place the
way hardwood floors are, but rather "floats" with the pieces
glued to each other rather than to the under flooring. If you
are doing one room in laminate flooring, you can easily
complete it as a weekend project.
About The Author: Kurt Schefken pens almost entirely for
http://www.insidewoodworking.com
, a web page with topics
around discount floors and cheap floors. You can learn about
his work over at
http://www.insidewoodworking.com/flooring/discount_laminate_flooring.html
and other sources for discount laminate flooring.
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