According to real estate professionals, one of the most significant ways to increase your home’s value is to install hardwood floors. Data on home sales shows that installing hardwood flooring can increase a home’s value by as much as $10,000. When considering how the flooring affects home value, there’s more than enough of a return to make the investment worthwhile.
The phrase, “wood is good,” is often thrown about in real estate circles. The simple truth is that a home with hardwood floors will sell more quickly than one with carpet. Wood floors are considered timeless, so you can enjoy them for years, with minimal remodeling, and never worry about them going out of style. Wood floors add warmth and richness to a room while also providing and air of elegance. Hardwood floors are also easy to keep looking good and maintain, whereas their flooring counterpart, carpet, can more easily get stains and trap smells. Because of wood’s resistance to harboring allergens, wood is the a great option for those with allergies.
Comparisons between wood, carpet, tile, laminate and vinyl show that wood floors can be a better investment than some of the other flooring. The average price of standard wood floors is roughly a few dollars more than the average price for carpet. However, carpets will need a pad underneath to keep them from wearing out. When looking at the costs of national brands, the necessary padding costs negate the dollars saved on material. Carpet typically has a cheaper installation cost when compared to that for hardwood. However, carpet will damage more quickly and need to be replaced more often. Carpet’s life span is around eight years, according to government studies, and is less than that if there are pets or children living in the home. In contrast, hardwood can last decades and rarely needs to be replaced in a family’s lifetime.
Vinyl flooring is also an affordable option, costing significantly less than hardwood to install with a mid-grade material. However, those in home sales state that vinyl doesn’t improve a home’s value and is very difficult to remove.
Tile is another option that offers easy maintenance and the cost of installation is similar to that of hardwood. The affect of tile floors on home value depends on the tile material used, and is essentially a choice of preference. Laminate is very similar in look to wood floors but does not offer the same level of durability and value to a home.
Some people try to cut the cost of hardwood installation by doing it themselves. This certainly makes it more affordable and the relatively new prefinished slot-in-grove material does make a flooring project seem possible. However, the prefinished wood floors don’t have the same look or feel as traditional hardwood. Odds are that if it is your first time installing hardwood floors there will be some trial and error. A question that contemplating DIY’ers must ask themselves: ‘Would you prefer to use your valuable time to learn, or delegate and know that the job will be done right and in a timely manner?’
It will take around six hours to install 100 square feet of hardwood floors, according to do-in-yourself calculators. Professional installers already have the equipment and supplies, including an underlayment, fastners, adhesives, sealants, pneumatic nailer, etc.
In the end, hardwood floors will cost the least to maintain and will not lose value as the home ages. It will always add value. If you think about it, those who buy older homes may rip a lot of things out – but they always keep the hardwood floors.