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Is It Better to Repair Scratches in Hardwood Flooring Yourself or Let the Experts?

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Wondering if you should refinish your hardwood flooring yourself or bring in flooring professionals to fix scratches and more is not an uncommon situation to be in. Contrary to what a quick Google search may tell you, the pros of a self-refinish do not outweigh the cons of hiring a professional. We’ve compiled a quick list of problems our clients have run into when they’ve attempted a DIY (Do-it-yourself) refinish for their hardwood flooring.

Lower Quality Finished Product

You gather all the materials needed, watch hours of tutorials on fixing scratches in your hardwood flooring on YouTube, maybe ask a couple of friends to tag along, and now you are finally ready to get started. Unless one of your buddies is a professional carpenter, you’re already at a disadvantage. Just watching a few hours of videos doesn’t make you a professional. You are bound to run into problems, especially if this is your first time refinishing hardwood. These problems, however minor they may seem, tend to stack up.

The machine experts use to refinish floors can cost upwards of $20,000. Even a higher end machine, rented from a hardware store such as Home Depot, can’t measure up to what a professional would bring to the job. Calculate the cost of all equipment you may need, including goggles, masks, gloves, and knee pads, and you may already be better off hiring flooring professionals. Keep in mind that any mistakes made by a hired professional be corrected at no extra cost to you, while any damage you cause yourself will come right out of your pocket.

The Finish Will Not Last as Long

 Sanding scratches out of your floor is a delicate art. If any error occurs during the process, the stain and polyurethane may not adhere properly. This could put the longevity of your finish at risk, limiting its lifespan to only two to four years. Using a professional service, you can expect your finish to last seven to ten years. Any cost saving you thought you had, could be lost.

It Will Take Longer

Someone with experience will obviously complete a task faster than someone without it. Flooring professionals typically take around a day to sand and refinish 1,000 square feet of hardwood. Homeowners attempting to do it on their own could take three to five times longer. After adding in the cost of renting equipment, you may start to wish you had put that money toward hiring professionals.

Verdict: Hire a Professional

We get it. The cost of refinishing and fixing scratches in your floor can be daunting and it is natural to have a DIY, cost-saving mindset. But the truth is, we’ve heard one too many horror stories from clients who initially tried to do it themselves. Give us a call for a completely free consultation at (202) 872-9860. Classic Floor Designs has over 40 years experience in the DC metro area and would love to put that experience to work for your next hardwood flooring project.

 

 

Refinishing Hardwood Floors Doesn’t Have to Be Messy

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If your hardwood floors are scratched and dull, you can bring them back to their former beauty by refinishing them. One major drawback of refinishing wood floors is the dust that is produced. When you use a traditional floor sander, tiny dust particles will be emitted into the air, settling throughout your home or business. Because of this, home and business owners that want to refinish their floors must take substantial preparatory steps to minimize dust collecting on everything when they choose traditional floor sanding. Cleanup after your floors have been sanded can also be a nightmare. Fortunately, Classic Floor Designs offers dustless floor refinishing so that you can avoid the problems that the dust can otherwise cause.

What is dustless hardwood floor refinishing?

We use specialized equipment to refinish your hardwood floors without leaving behind a significant amount of dust. Our sanders are connected with special hoses to a powerful vacuum that is located on our trailers. As our professional refinishers sand your floors, the dust is sucked out of your home and into our trucks. This system can allow you to stay in your home or business while your floors are being sanded without worrying about breathing in the carcinogenic dust that can be produced during the process.

Benefits of no-dust refinishing

There are several benefits of choosing to refinish your floors with our no-dust system, including the following:

  • Less time preparing
  • Less time cleaning up
  • Better health

Before no-dust refinishing systems were available, people who wanted to sand their floors had to spend a significant amount of time preparing. They had to cover all of their furniture and stay elsewhere while the process was completed. Our system allows you to minimize the amount of preparation that you would otherwise need to complete. With the powerful vacuum technology, the dust is safely removed away from your home and your belongings, allowing you to stay in your home or business without having to cover everything.

Since most of the dust will be vacuumed directly out of your home or business and into our truck, there will also be much less time needed for cleaning up. In the past, people would find dust piling up for weeks after they had already cleaned after their floors were sanded. This is because sanding floors sends dust into your vents. From there, the dust may then be circulated and deposited throughout your home, allowing dust to continue settling everywhere for weeks.

Dust-free floor sanding is also much healthier for you, your family, your employees or your customers. Dust from sanding certain types of wood can be carcinogenic. Having high levels of dust in the air may also cause respiratory problems, allergic reactions or worsened asthma symptoms. Even if you leave your home during the sanding process or have the work completed while your business is closed, a lot of dust will still remain behind if you don’t use a dust-free floor refinishing process.

Added benefits for business owners

If you are a business owner who wants to refinish your floors, you will enjoy the added benefit of being able to continue working while the floors are being refinished. Without a dust-free sanding process, businesses have to close their doors while the work is being completed and during the cleanup process. They also have to cover and protect all of their furniture and office equipment to keep dust from getting in. With our system, you can continue to operate your business like you normally do, which can help you to continue making profits during the refinishing process.

Refinishing your existing hardwood floors doesn’t have to be a messy job. When you choose our system, you can enjoy beautiful results without the hassles involved with dust. To learn more about our dustless sanding and refinishing services, call Classic Floor Designs today.

Changing the Color of Your Hardwood Floors

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Have you ever taken a look at your hardwood floors and wished that you could change their color? Or perhaps you’re looking into buying a house, but you want the hardwood to be darker or lighter than the current floor is? Good news: you may not have known, but when you refinish a hardwood floor, you can absolutely change the color of it! It doesn’t matter if you’re going light to dark, dark to light, or anywhere in between: if you can sand and refinish your floors, you can change the color of them.

The process for sanding and refinishing is simpler than you might think. This first step is to purchase or rent a sanding machine and sand down the floor that you are refinishing. Do about three sandings, moving from coarse grit down to your finest grit for best results. This should give your hardwood a smooth surface that will readily accept any stain that you add. Your floor should look basically like brand-new hardwood once you’re done.

With that step out of the way, now it’s time to choose your stain. There are many, many different options ranging all different colors, so try picking out a couple of choices and testing them on your own floors first. This is an essential step because every floor is different and may take different colors differently than another. You may be hesitant to stain over a large area if you’re just testing it out, but we can assure you that this will give you the best visuals and is well worth the time spent.

The last step is to add two to three coats of polyurethane. This coating will take about 24 hours per layer to dry, assuming you’re using an oil base (water based polyurethane dries faster but isn’t as durable). Make sure that after every coat application, you buff the floors in order to smooth them out and help the polyurethane last longer. 90-95% of people select a satin finish for their hardwood, but don’t let that stop you from checking out some of the other choices: you can look at matte, gloss, and semi-gloss, as well!

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