How to choose between carpet and hardwood flooring

In most homes, you will either see hardwood flooring or carpet as the two most prevalent choices made by homeowners.

As spring is in full swing, how do you decide what flooring suits your needs or your family’s lifestyle?

Here are some considerations for each floor type we found over at The Spruce where they explore the two different types of flooring and characteristics of each one.

Hardwood Flooring

Hardwood flooring has been viewed as an upgrade when purchasing, building or remodeling a home. There are several variations of hardwood flooring that make more than just ordinary. If you select hardwood floors and tire of the finish, it’s always an option to refinish them in another color.

Easy to Clean – In high traffic areas, homeowners are choosing hardwood as many find hardwood much easier to clean than carpet. Often stains will soak into carpet tending to leave a permanent mark until a new carpet is installed.

Better for Those with Allergies: If you suffer from allergies, the dust that flies into the air can make The fact that carpet can attract and hold dust and microorganisms can also have an effect on anyone working or living in the space; especially if they suffer from allergies. Every time you walk across the carpet millions of tiny particles can fly into the air.

With hardwood, all you have to do is wipe or sweep the surface clean, and you can see that it is free of those same potentially harmful particles.

Longevity: Properly maintained hardwood flooring could last for decades, and some of the higher end materials can last for generations. With carpet, you are going to have to rip up the floor and replace it every few years.

The ability to last longer means that the initial material investment pays off more over time with hardwood floors.

Refinished: When a hardwood floor is damaged, either by a stain or through some physical trauma, it can be refinished to look like new. This involves sanding down the surface past any defects and then re-applying the stain and or finish products to make the floor look completely revitalized. Depending on the thickness of the material this is something that can be done several times over the life of the floor.

Versatility: If you want to soften a hardwood floor and get some of the benefits of carpet in a room, you can always put a rug down covering part or nearly all of the space. The reverse is not true if you have carpet installed.

Timeless: Hardwood flooring has been used in homes for hundreds of years, and despite constant shifts in style and trend, it has never stopped being popular. It always matches whatever colors and accessories happen to be in vogue, and can easily handle numerous different decorative choices.

Natural and Ecologically Friendly: Carpet is made largely from petroleum, a very limited resource, and is not natural in any way. Hardwood is a natural material; it is made from trees which can be replanted and renewed.

However, when buying hardwood materials, you do want to do a little research and make sure that they are being harvested by an ecologically sound company in an environmentally friendly way.

Rooms that might be considered for hardwood include Kitchen, Family Room, Great Room, Sunroom, Dining Room, Office, and Bedrooms.

Carpet Flooring

Soft: The biggest draw to carpet is that it is soft. It feels great beneath bare feet like the entire world is padded and comforting. This is particularly soothing in bedrooms, children’s rooms, and some family and living room areas, where you want to promote an atmosphere of comfort and relaxation.

Warm: Carpet is going to be much warmer than hardwood floors, especially on a chilly winter morning. It acts not only like a blanket for your feet, but it also helps to insulate the room, ensuring that warmth remains indoors and doesn’t slip through more porous surface materials.

Comfort: The fact that it is soft and warm makes carpet just about the most comfortable flooring material you can stand on.

This can be especially important when standing for long periods of time, where harder wood floors can cause pain in feet, ankles, and knees.

Cost: Carpet is considerably less expensive than hardwood materials. While they do need to be replaced every few years, the life of the material can be greatly extended by proper care and maintenance. This makes the long-term cost of carpet comparable to certain types of hardwood flooring.

Safety: The fact that it is so soft makes carpet a particularly safe flooring choice. With hardwood, a trip or fall can result in injuries and broken objects. With carpet you have a type of cushion running across the entire room, making damage from an accident much less likely.

Quiet: A major complaint about hardwood floors is that they are loud. When installed on upper levels people down below often complain that they can hear every footstep. An old installation may also squeak in certain spots. With carpet, the surface of the entire floor is padded and insulated so that noise won’t easily pass up or down through the level.

Children: Carpet is great if you have kids because they can get down on the floor and use the entire surface of the room as a play area that is soft, cushioned, and safe against most falls.

Rooms most often considered for carpet include Bedrooms, Playrooms, Family Rooms, and Theater Rooms.