When do you want hardwood floors in your home?
It is said that the carpet in your home is the biggest air filter in it, capturing all the dust, mold and dander in the building until vacuumed.
This is very bad for asthmatics and those allergic to anything the carpet traps. This is why hardwood floors are recommended for those with respiratory problems.
Hardwood floors have an element of luxury about them, because they have always been more expensive than carpet.
Cleanliness can be much easier with carpets. Stains rarely soak in. Sweeping, too, is typically easier than vacuuming.
When well maintained, hardwood floors can last decades.
Wood floors have been used for years and remain popular. You don’t have to worry about fashions changing and people hate your carpet. Think of how 1970s shag carpet looks to today’s consumers.
If you want to have a throw rug for the look of it there, a comfortable place to sit on the floor or provide protection to the floor where people come in, you have that option with hardwood floors. You can’t put wood panels, though, on carpeted floors.
When do you want carpet in your home?
Price is a major determining factor when selecting carpets for your home. Depending on the type of hardwood, you’ll look at paying two to three times as much for hardwood floors for the installation.
Carpet is softer and more comfortable to walk on when you have bare feet. It is also more comfortable to stand on for extended periods of time.
Carpet absorbs impacts to a degree, so dropped items are less likely to break when dropped on a carpeted floor.
Depending on the type of carpet and the incident, you’re also less likely to get severely hurt landing on carpeted floors yourself – which is why playrooms are either carpeted or have padded play mats on a hard floor like concrete.
You are less likely to slip on carpet than a wooden floor, especially if it is wet. And a hot water heater that leaks over your vacation may require ripping out carpet and pad of one room, but you won’t come home to a house of warped floors. Plus replacing the pad and carpet is a quick job if you have skilled professionals do the work.
You have more color and pattern choices when you use carpet. You can have hardwood floors from white to beige to cream to brown. Carpets come in a literal rainbow.
Carpet is warmer than hardwood floors, both to your feet on a cold morning and as insulation from the cold basement to the upper layers of the home.
You enjoy the relative silence provided by carpets and the padding underneath over hearing every click of one’s shoes on the floor, the sound of every toy a child rolls across it, as well as the creaking and shifting of wood floors on stairs and second story floors.
You can’t stand the smells of refinished floors or re-staining that are periodically required of hardwood floors.
Your home has suffered from wood ants or termites, and you don’t want to worry about the floor being ruined along with the roof and wall supports.
Carpet installs faster.
Carpet hides dirt, so you don’t have to clean it as often. Carpet wins if you don’t want to have to sweep every two or three days.
Where It Is a Tie
Hardwood floors can be made from reclaimed wood or renewable materials like bamboo, but you can buy carpet made from renewable sustainable materials such as wool or recycled nylon fibers. Environmentally, it isn’t a simple answer to say one flooring type over another.
If you live in a hundred year old (or older) home, softwood floors were regularly used. Hardwood floors maintain the historic look of the home. If the home was built in the 1920s or later, it probably had wall to wall carpeting. So it isn’t possible to say which flooring material is more authentic in older homes, because the answer depends on the age of the home.