I was talking to the missus the other night, and she made the mistake of asking me what was so much better about having hardwood flooring than anything else. Her asking me this was surprising given that she knows how I love to get up onto my soapbox about hardwood. Here is what I said:
1: Appearance:
Properly laid and looked after, hardwood floor will have a deep glossy shine, and the deep red woods, dark woods and light woods are all beautiful in their own way.
Then there are the mosaic effects that the professionals and designers can create using multiple shades and species of wood, but I always favour the plain, simple beauty of the solid plank.
That covers appearance, but there is also the appearances factor: there is something about a hardwood floor that just oozes class, it is the flooring that people put in a property when they really care about it. That is for the keeping up with the joneses bit in all of us.
2: Value for Money
Properly looked after solid wood flooring will last a lifetime. This is compared to carpets which should really be replaced every 5 years at least, and even laminates will need to be replaced several times in a lifetime.
Therefore, though hardwood flooring will cost more at the outset, the lifespan, on top of all the other benefits covered here it offers by far the most value for money.
3: Easy to Clean
This one is pretty self explanatory; hardwood flooring does not need to be vacuumed, just brushed and polished. If you spill something you just soak it up and clean the affected area.
Carpets are a nightmare to keep clean, every spill can become a stain, and no matter how good your hoover, you can never be sure you have gotten all of the dust and the dust mites, which can cause asthma and a range of other ailments, which brings me to the next point:
4: Cleanliness, Hygiene
It is a commonly held theory that the wide use of carpets is a large part of the reason why cases of Asthma has grown exponentially in recent years.
We once had a sales rep come round and show us a Kirby hoover (yes it was years ago, when I were just a lad, read in Yorkshire accent).
The demonstration was scary; he got us to vacuum a square foot of rug as many times as we thought it would take to get all the dust and make it completely clean, so we did. Then he vacuumed the same area once back and forth with the Kirby and proudly showed us the amount of dust and dirt it had collected.
This was supposed to make us realise that we couldn’t live without the Kirby and buy. Instead it made us wonder how much dust it was leaving behind, and invest in hardwood flooring the following day.
There is no place for dirt and dust to hide in a hardwood floored house, and if we all started covering floors with solid wood then Asthma cases may well be reduced.
5: Adds Value to a Property
Again, this one explains itself. It is a fact that properly laid, and high quality solid hardwood flooring adds value to a home. Obviously the value added depends on the house, the area, the type of floor and potentially more factors, but it is proven to add value. In the current market who can sniff at that, especially given all the other factors that make hardwood flooring the best floor covering in the world.
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