Anyone have/seen up close vinyl flooring?

[Willow]

We are starting some renos on our place next week and can't figure out what to do about flooring in the back of the house.

Bit of background (the short version) we brought this place a few years ago and always planned on some cosmetic renos. Then the back section of the house started to fall down around our ears (slight exaggeration but it was pretty bad) so we had to spend $20k on underpinning the back of the house. As a result (and two babies later) not much else has been done.

We finally have the money to do the cosmetic repairs (all the cracks in the plaster, cornices etc) and we are also replacing all our doors, skirting boards and door frames with high profile stained timber. We're kinda going for a federation type look.

Anyhoo...back to the flooring. We currently have tiles throughout. They aren't too bad but show up the dirt and are a bit dated and chipped in places.

The biggest issue is our main living area. Because the extension on the back of the house wasn't done properly, the floor is uneven and to cover this the previous eejit owner put one of those gold carpet edging strip thingos all the way along the join. It looks hideous, everyone is constantly tripping over it and it is a permanent reminder that we brought a bit of a lemon There is also a raised tiled section in the corner of the room where a fireplace used to be and we want to get rid of that too.

DH wants to put in a floating timber floor. I'm not sold. PIL had theirs done about 2 years ago and it has not worn well. It is quite scratched and I'm worried how it will hold up with three young children in a heavy traffic area. I've seen quite a few and some of them look...well fake and cheap iykwim. Another reason I don't want it is the expense. We are not staying here long term and I kinda don't want to spend any more money on this place than we have to.

I suggested carpet but DH is not keen. We are planning on moving in a year or two and the house will be rented out at that point if all goes according to plan. He has heard horror stories of tenants trashing carpet and is also concerned about wear and staining with the three kids. I see his point but carpet is so much cheaper to replace (we will be selling eventually).

So, I suggested we have a look at vinyl flooring. We'd probably go for the timber plank stuff. I've checked out a few websites and it honestly doesn't look too bad. It's apparently hard wearing and easy to clean.

Does anyone have it in their home or has anyone seen it up close?

OK, so that wasn't such a short version but any opinions would be welcome!

[~Trish~]

Hey love . I have seen it up close in a store because we were considering it for our kitchen area. These days vinyl looks so good (well, I reckon anyway ). I think it would look great in our kitchen, but DH is worried about long-term wear with our three kids (we plan on staying here for a long time). We have floor boards under our tiles so we are thinking of ripping up the tiles and polishing the boards, depending on their condition.

Good luck and have fun deciding!!

[*TripleJ*]

we have vinyl but u have to be careful with sharp things on the floor we have a few rips in our floor from moving furniture

[Willow]

J - Thanks for your reply

we have a few rips in our floor from moving furniture

Wouldn't really be an issue for us. We haven't moved furniture since we've been here and have a modular lounge suite so we can really only have the room set out the way it is now. Although with small children, I can't guarantee there wouldn't be any rips! LOL.

Trish - I agree. I was surprised how good the modern stuff looks.

We're going to head out to a few flooring places tomorrow to have a look but that's always hard with three little ones in tow!

[*TripleJ*]

yeah its mostly in the kitchen where we had the issues with the fridge

[fionas]

I've only seen vinyl flooring in magazines and it looks quite good.

I've always liked cork and it's apparently environmentally friendly and you can get all sort of effects in it these days like parquetry. I'm not sure how well it wears but I like the fact that it looks and feels warm.

[BrightSparkles]

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So, I suggested we have a look at vinyl flooring. We'd probably go for the timber plank stuff. I've checked out a few websites and it honestly doesn't look too bad. It's apparently hard wearing and easy to clean.

We have this and I LOVE it!! I wasn't keen on the idea but now i've seen it and had it its great! Easy to clean and look after and looks good, easy to maintain!

[Willow]

Thanks for all the posts guys, I really appreciate it!

ours is wood look vinyl planks not staight vinyl so no problems with dinting, indentation or bubbling of any kind.

I agree, this is not the stuff that was around 20 years ago.

We looked at a product at Harvey Norman that we're pretty happy with. It is 3.5mm thick, timber finish planks. It comes with a lifetime warranty for residential use and was about $48 per square metre. We don't have straight floors in places (the builder is going to fix this for us with a leveling product) but the finish on this product is textured and I doubt it would show up much.

We will talk to our builder about it when he starts on Monday, but now that I've seen it, I'm in love! We're probably going to put it in the laundry too. It's 100% waterproof and can even be used in bathrooms (and depending on how it goes, we'll probably put it in our ensuite when we renovate that later in the year).

We looked at the floating floors there too and to be honest, this stuff looked so much better IMO.

Salad - I can see us eventually putting this in all our tiled areas, I think it's going to look fantastic!

[Nelle]

Ours is brand new too - but I suspect that there are probably many different qualities available, and how well it's installed is key too. Given that we bought a cookie cutter house, I'd be surprised if much love and care went into the vinyl. Probably getting some recommendations and doing it as a separate job will make a difference.

[Willow]

Thanks Nelle. We'll talk to our builder before we go ahead with this brand, but the sales person at HN said it was their top of the range so hoping it'll be OK.

I might check out the brand Salad suggested too - thanks hun!

[BrightSparkles]

We don't have straight floors in places (the builder is going to fix this for us with a leveling product) but the finish on this product is textured and I doubt it would show up much.

We dont have straight/flat floors and you can see it depending on the angle you look at it. But if you aren't directly looking for it, you probably wouldn't notice it too much.

[Willow]

Thanks Sunshine.

It seriously couldn't be any worse than what we have now, but I'm sure our builder will be able to tell us if he thinks it's suitable or not.

[Willow]

Double post