Has anyone done DIY laminate flooring?

[Pink_Converse]

Everyone says not to pay the $4K in labor and just to do it ourselves, that it's very easy. Anyone do it and have a bad experience. We aren't very handy, but we aren't morons either so we can't decide what to do. The people who tell us to DIY aren't people we could get help from and we haven't seen how their turned out so we can't get them to help us or anything.

[Tanya]

I haven't installed myself, but I just wanted to say that $4k seems really high! How much square footage are we talking about? We got ours installed for ~$2/sq ft. And they were the much more complicated glue-together, not snap-together. That included upgraded pad and leveling of the concrete sub-floor. If yours are snap-together, I've known a lot of people that have done these and they said it was quite easy. There's good videos available from the major manufacturers.

[nuhmah]

I have never done it myself, but I think that if you have some DIY skills and some patience, you can do it!

One thing I notice about "novices" putting in floors is that they forget to stagger their boards! Don't try to line up all your seams, it doesn't look natural. :)

[LRL]

We have installed laminate ourselves. 4K seems steep unless you have a huge house! It can be complicated depending on the type of laminate you decide to buy. I reccomend the completely glueless laminate that snaps together. DH and I used a glued edge laminate and that was quite a job! Feel free to ask me if you have any questions. :)

[Pink_Converse]

It was $7K total for Armstrong Swiftock, if I am reading the estimates right it was for 928.40 sq. ft. which I am really bad at estimating square footage so who know if that even makes sense. My house is over 2,800 sq. ft. and I am doing almost the entire bottom floor, except the bath, bedroom and gameroom. We got the estimate in 2002 so I can't remember if it was glueless or what.

Is ceramic tile cheaper than laminate? I went to Floor and Decor today and all of the laminates I saw looked very fake so I am wondering if I should even go that way now.

[LRL]

Ceramic tile might be cheaper than laminate, but IMO way more labor intensive. We did our bathrooms in tile, and we bought 12 inch tiles from Home Depot for about $1.20 each. You might save money if you already have supplies like a wet saw (which I totally reccomend- it is a nightmare to cut them with a regular tile saw/cutter when you have a ton of corners). Also, you have to consider the mastic and grout for the tiles. It will definitely be messier, but if you like the look more I am sure the price can be comparable or even cheaper. We bought our laminate (Pergo) on-line, from ifloors.com I think. The price was about $4.00 square foot which was for the most expensive line at the time. Keep in mind that laminate will require fewer tools.

My reccomendation- get someone to do all the tiling for you if that is the route you take. It will save you headaches unless you are ready for a huge project.

1000 sq/ft would be too much for us to tile!

[SiValleySteph]

We are possibly the only people who tried to install laminate flooring and failed. :o

If you have a square room, it's pretty easy. We had a complicated situation. We had 3 doors to get under the doorjambs, we had curved drywall corners to go around, a sliding door, etc. It wasn't the laying down of the laminate - it was the finishing details that killed us. We ended up returning our laminate and hiring someone else. We had a small square footage (~200-250 sq ft) and it was about $700 for materials and installation. We pulled up our own carpet.

Here are some of the obstacles we had to get around:
http://im1.shutterfly.com/procserv/47b4da25b3127cce9c66468166e200000015108EZuWrFs4aK
http://im1.shutterfly.com/procserv/47b4da25b3127cce9c66468f66ec00000016108EZuWrFs4aK

Totally hard.

[Akemi]

Okay, I'll jump in and agree with SiValleySteph... it was a lot harder than it seemed like it was going to be, mostly because of the edges and doorways and things. Not that I helped at all (it was all DH and his dad), but it took them about twice as long as they had budgeted, and it didn't all go perfectly. If I had it to do again, I would probably hire someone.

[Tanya]

Ooh, yeah, that reminds me of the crazy tool our installers had to use around our corners. It cut out the baseboards at the exact height of the new floor so it would slide under smoothly. I remember thinking, yikes, glad we didn't have to figure out how to make this work around corners ourselves! And it's not like we would have gotten that tool--maybe it can be rented, though?

[screetch]

What's the quality of your home like? Although our house is fairly new (9 yrs old) we have typical Florida construction (read: not the greatest quality) and it was difficult to get it just right. We didn't do it ourselves but we had a lot of issues with the installation. Our flooring installers blamed the poor workmanship on the builders, and our baseboard installers (who, incidentally, work for our builder) confirmed this and blamed the builder as well -- said when the walls are uneven and ground isn't perfect, it can make for tricky installation. Our neighbors did it themselves and they had a rough and lengthy time (took them three long weekends, with three people working).

You'll also have to buy the right cutting tools, if you don't already have them.

Here in FL where building and construction costs have skyrocketed in the last year, I was able to find $1.50/sq ft for installation. Some were higher but a lot were in this ballpark. The material for tile can be cheaper, but generally installation is more expensive. That said, I do know people who have installed tile themselves and said they would do it again. But they are DIYers.

[Secret_Squirrel]

It was $7K total for Armstrong Swiftock, if I am reading the estimates right it was for 928.40 sq. ft. which I am really bad at estimating square footage so who know if that even makes sense. My house is over 2,800 sq. ft. and I am doing almost the entire bottom floor, except the bath, bedroom and gameroom. We got the estimate in 2002 so I can't remember if it was glueless or what.

Is ceramic tile cheaper than laminate? I went to Floor and Decor today and all of the laminates I saw looked very fake so I am wondering if I should even go that way now.

Did you say Armstrong Swiftlock?

My husband and I just did our bedroom using that exact same flooring last weekend. It was super-easy, and we are not very handy (workin' on it).

I purchased a different brand first because I liked the finish, but it was terrible and wouldn't lock together properly. We took it all back and got the Armstrong flooring and it was so much easier. The pieces snapped right in good and tight. We taped the spacers to the wall with painter's tape and cut sizes with our circular saw and carbide blade. It was so easy, I could do it all by myself (but having 2 people made it a little quicker).

We bought ours at Lowe's and they have an installation video for $8 bucks. I'm a visual learner, so that was helpful to me.

Just remember: When you make a cut at the end of the row, re-use your piece to start the new row and it will be nice and staggered. And no piece smaller than 8".

Ceramic tile prices vary a lot - you can buy it for as little as 99 cents sf. But tile needs a more specific subfloor which can add to the cost, plus grout. And it's more complicated to do it yourself - you need a tub saw for the cuts (my ex used to lay tile a long time ago).

Laminates are not real wood, so they aren't going to look 100% authentic. But they have their own benefits - ease of installation and low cost and low maintenence being a few. But have you seen the new snap-together floating hardwood floors by Bruce? They seemed to be like laminates, but made of engineered wood. We were intrigued by them, but got a great deal on the Armstrong laminate - plus we were afraid they'd be harder to install and we wanted to go as easy as possible since we're so new at this. But it might work for you.

[Pink_Converse]

Secret Squirrel-I am going to look into Bruce again. I forgot all about them. They look pretty real but I haven't seen them in person.

Thanks for all the replies.

[marteneym]

We did ours on our own. (I should say DH and my dad) It snapped together. The ahrdest part as others said was getting around corners and cabinets. The floor board trim corrects alot though. It took them longer than the expected, but it was done in 3days. Family rm, dining and kitchen( one very long rm).

[Sonicstef]

Considering tackling this project but I'd love to hear first hand from anyone that has done it.

How hard was it? What tools did you need/use?

I can save over $1K by putting it down myself but not sure if its worth it.

[Kari331]

How big of an area are you doing? Do you know if it will require seams?

[Sonicstef]

Its about 275 square feet. It doesnt require any midfloor seams...just the edges for expansion.

[suzubeane]

I recently installed one, and not only would I say it's easy to install yourself, I would say you you MUST install it yourself because it is also so easy to damage on installation. After I realized that banging the planks together too hard could damage them, I started running my hands over every joint after installing each plank. Even if it was hardly noticeable to the eye, I knew that time would not be kind to the ends of the boards that had lifted just a bit. I don't think you can expect an outside installer to be that picky, but over the years, it will make a difference.

The tools you need are a hammer and an installation kit that is sold by the flooring manufacturer (all of them have one) It is comprised of a hammering block and a steel piece for getting the end planks in. I think my kit was like $15.00. You also need something to cut them with, but it does not have to be a power tool. One of the saws should be a jig saw (if power) or a coping saw (if hand.)

My only other recommendation is that if you choose a variety that has a repetitive pattern, that you open all the boxes and take all the pieces out, grouping them by kind. Number the pieces with tape, and make sure like-numbered pieces don't end up too close together. I wished I'd done this on my kitchen floor, and instead I had to inspect each piece before laying it. I didn't want two identical pieces to lay where you could see both at the same time in your field of vision. (It's a small room, and seeing identical wood knots would have ruined the effect.)

eta: what do you mean by "seams?" I was assuming you meant click-together planks, and answered accordingly.

[Sonicstef]

Thanks suz....that give me some hope. Im just worried about doing a bad job of it and then regretting it. (Ive never done anything like this before)

Im thinking Im going to buy a low end power miter saw since it will be handy for the moldings. Do you think that is worth the $100 purchase price

Did you have a problem getting the old moldings off without damaing them? I'd love to reuse what I have (since I dont like those matching laminate moldings).

What did you use the coping saw for?

[suzubeane]

Heh - no molding here. I used it in a remodeled space, and the baseboard trim (when I get to it) will be new.

(You can see the floor in the link below - my LJ remodeling posts are all public.)

I think my miter saw was around $100.00, and I've used it for the entire remodel; it's a very handy tool - you won't regret owning one.

I didn't use a coping saw, because I have a jigsaw. My room is not a rectangle, so I used it in areas where I had to cut *into* the plank to fit it around things. If you're room is four-sided with no juts or oddities, you might not need one.

Once you get going, it really is quite easy, and you can stand on it while you're doing it! The hardest part was learning how not to hit them too hard.

[SiValleySteph]

I'm the lone dissenter. We tried to install laminate flooring oursleves and ended up returning it and hiring someone. It was very easy to install in the rectangle portion of the room, but we had a lot of obstacles to go around. We had 3 doors, rounded drywall corners at the pass between rooms, abutted to stairs, abutted to tile, etc. Hiring someone was an excellent move on our part. :)

Here's a picture of some of the obstacles we had to deal with:
http://im1.shutterfly.com/procserv/47b4da25b3127cce9c66468f66ec00000016108EZuWrFs4aK

If you have a mostly rectangular area, it would be a LOT easier.

ETA - we added the quarter round to cover the expansion and kept the exisiting moldings. We didn't remove them to install the floor. I would have preferred to remove the moldings and get new ones, but I think that was too much more of a PITA/expense to make it worthwhile.

[mandersald]

we installed our own laminate flooring our kitchen. i think it was a very good experience, but i think a lot of your success depends on the shape of your room. if you have a lot of door jams, corners or stairs like SiValleySteph, you might be better off hiring someone. we had a few door jams to work around, and that took a lot of extra time to figure out, but thankfully my engineer husband could figure it out. we made templates with pieces of paper before we cut the boards just to make sure.

we also removed and reused our baseboards. its not too bad, you just have to be careful when removing. we used a pry bar to remove them, and they came right out. putting them back on is more of a challenge, i think. it might be worth renting a nail gun for that. also, i don't think its necessary to buy the install kit, because we did just fine without one. we used pieces of cardboard as spacers, and we made our own tapping block out of a scrap piece of wood.

we used a jigsaw and a miter saw. both were very handy tools. just use fine toothed saws to prevent splitting. remember to wear ear plugs as they're noisy!

it took us 2 weekends to do. the first weekend was learning how to put the pieces together, and figure out how we were going to cut them, lay the boards out, and cut the foam stuff for underneath. (i agree with suzubeane about the repetative pieces part.) the second weekend we got it all done. we are very happy with the results.

[suzubeane]

also, i don't think its necessary to buy the install kit, because we did just fine without one. we used pieces of cardboard as spacers, and we made our own tapping block out of a scrap piece of wood.I would absolutely recommend against this for the brand I used: Uniclic. The tapping block made by the company has the exact tongue to fit into the plank's groove. If you hit too hard with something that's bouncing against it instead, it could get damaged.

I should mention that once the planks are installed, the ends will not get damaged; it's just the installing/hitting them together that could damage the ends, and the sides if you use a block of wood instead of the installation block they sell. It was worth the $15.00, and came with bar to get the end pieces in where the tapping block would not fit.

[Sonicstef]

Ok girls...im doing it today. Keep fingers crossed that I dont lose any appendages with the power tools :)

[Sue]

Once you get the hang of it, it moves pretty quickly. We installed it in our living room, dining room, hallway and 1/2 bath.

Good luck :)

[Aimee]

Good luck! DH and his dad did it in our living room/dining room area and it went really quickly. THey did about 500 sq feet in a day. The hardest part was getting things "square" since our house is not level and the walls aren't perfectly square. DH ended up nailing down a few of the pieces into the subfloor so we'd have things straight to start with, rather than have things get more and more progressively crooked as you got into the room, and after the rest of the floor was in, he took up the nails.

We didn't take up our baseboards, but we did add quarter-round molding on top of it to finish things. We did buy the install kit, but FIL had a skill saw and a chop saw (for the mitred edges on the quarter round) that we coud use.

The transition pieces that the company sold didn't work out for us because the adjoining floors (tile in the foyer and kitchen) weren't a standard height. DH ended up making them using a table saw. One he made from scratch from a block of wood, and one he "engineered" from an existing wood threshold piece.

FWIW, though, my DH is an engineer and FIL is really good at this kind of stuff. It probably was easier for us, but it's not impossible for a non-engineer to do it.

[SiValleySteph]

FWIW, both DH & I are engineers as well. :D But we still hired someone.

To be fair, we are electrical engineers in the semiconductor industry.

[Aimee]

FWIW, both DH & I are engineers as well. :D But we still hired someone.

To be fair, we are electrical engineers in the semiconductor industry.

Hehe. My DH is an electrical engineer as well, but he's a huge geometry geek. For years, he kept trying to prove that an angle could be trisected using constructions or something like that. I never quite understood it. The kids will have to get their math genes from him.

[screetch]

I agree with others who said it can really depend on the area. My DH (who is a systems engineer, BTW ;) ) travels a lot and between that and having a one year old, we decided the best course of action would be to just hire someone so we wouldn't be teeming in messes. It turned out to be a very wise decision. According to both the flooring installers and the baseboard installers, cutting pieces just right for our walls and layout was rather challenging. Our builder was apparently a little sloppy and the walls weren't always straight (our house was in Florida, land of the world's crappiest builders), plus we had a ton of rounded corners. We were also doing more than 1000sf, which obviously would take more time and effort than 275sf. Oh yeah, our flooring was Mannington -- the installers did mention this brand was the easiest to install.

The guy at the flooring store suggested taking out our existing baseboards and either salvaging them or buying new ones. He poo-pooed using quarter rounds. I thought we could salvage the old baseboards and reinstall ourselves but a few cracked and in the end they just looked junky. But if I had to do it all over again, I'd put up the quarter rounds. I've since seen them and think they look perfectly fine.

[karacourt]

Has anyone done laminate flooring in their bathroom? I've seen it in magazine ads in Southern Living & BHG. I think it would look great in my master bath but kinda nervous how it would hold up to water, etc. Thx!

[johnny'sgirl]

We're about to tackle it (at the beginning of April) so I'm eager as well to hear stories!

[johnny'sgirl]

Has anyone done laminate flooring in their bathroom? I've seen it in magazine ads in Southern Living & BHG. I think it would look great in my master bath but kinda nervous how it would hold up to water, etc. Thx!

I read somewhere that if you do put it in a bathroom, to make sure to caulk *really* well. That said, we aren't putting it in our bathroom because my hubby has the annoying habit of taking half the shower with him every time he gets out. :)

[Sonicstef]

Hmm..i thought i came back to update this thread but I guess not.

Did it a few weeks ago and it took the better part of 2 days to do the full room with all the doors, molding, etc.. My house is old and has uneven walls, etc... so that added a lot to the time frame. Anyway, I think it came out really nicely and since there were so many special cuts I think we probably did a better job than the average installer would have done (since he wouldnt have spent so much time making sure everything was just right).

Definitely a great DIY job if you have the desire to do it and some power tools :)

[Janey]

*bumping* In case others have additional experiences. We are looking at doing laminate flooring in our upstairs area. There is a hallway, a bedroom with 1 closet, and a bedroom with 2 small closets.

We were at Ikea on Saturday and are considering their laminate flooring. Has anyone heard anything about it? We are considering the Hemse Flooring (http://www.ikea.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/ProductDisplay?topcategoryId=15582&catalogId=10103&storeId=12&productId=47046&langId=-1&parentCats=15582). At $0.99/SF, it seems like a pretty good deal.

B would rather use a system that would allow us to have a flush stair nosing piece instead of a nose piece that lays over the top, like the Ikea system does. It's just one stair nosing we'd be dealing with, but even so, if every time he walks up and down the stairs he makes this face :mad:, it'd be worth it to use another system.

[babyjinks]

I just wanted to say that we did master bed, dining room and kitchen and put all new moldings in all the rooms my hubby stained the molding himself and it turned out beautifully :) The only thing i did not see mentioned was to make sure to use a underlayment..we bought out laminate at costco and the underlayment included the kit to install with it.. it was soooooooooo worth it to do and looks so beautiful now :)