Hardwood Floors – No Returns
I have to leave for the airport in less than ten minutes, so this is going to be short as sweet.
There is a ying and a yang to ordering pre-finished tongue and groove hardwood floors. If you order too little, you’ll slow the job down by a few days at best waiting for more wood to arrive or at worst, the supplier won’t have any of the type of wood you are using left. Jamie and Brian told me when this happens, you are forced to switch the type of wood you are using halfway through the job.
We estimated at we would need 1,780 square feet to cover all of upstairs. That included an extra 10% for waste for bad cuts, bad boards, broken tongues etc. For 1,780 square feet we received 100 of these boxes (that weigh about 70lbs each).
By the time Jamie and Brian installed the floor in the two bedrooms and great room we had 39 boxes of flooring left. Wow, that is about $4,500 in extra flooring that can’t be returned!!!! So, we decided to put the hardwoods in the guest loft where Summer and I have been sleeping, on our soon to be enclosed screened in back porch and built a platform in my office for my desk and files. We still have enough wood left over to put tongue and groove above the closet in the master bedroom and above the bathroom. I’ll also be able to use it to trim out above the closets/great room.
Depending on how good I get with these tools I have here, I may even use it to build the shelves in the hallway closet and in the master closet. Heck, its good expensive wood that is going to last forever…and we have it…so we’re gonna use it.
In retrospect, we wouldn’t have spent the extra money if we had known we didn’t need to have this much hardwood flooring to finish the house, but it is allowing us to add a bunch of extras all out of beautiful teak.
Gotto go to the airport and then SURF!
December 7th, 2007 at 8:47 am
That is such beautiful flooring! Maybe a bench or two from extras.
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December 7th, 2007 at 11:33 am
If it makes you feel any better, with the dollar so weak right now $4500 is only like 1000 pounds in the UK.
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December 8th, 2007 at 3:14 am
Haha…Look at your ghetto office furniture!
I like the step-up in your office and I think extending the flooring onto the deck will make the house flow nicely. Bummer about have SO much extra, but live and learn!
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December 8th, 2007 at 3:50 am
yes yes yes, my office furniture is very ghetto. BUT…one step at a time. I can’t wait to get great, comfortable, good looking, practical office furniture…but I’d rather finish the master bath and keep working on that home made desk that looks horrible, but still holds my keyboard, computer and office phone.
Maybe I’ll build some nice Mahogany furniture and bookshelves to cover up the circuit breaker. Hmmmm…..
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December 8th, 2007 at 9:05 pm
Do they have Craig’s list in Puerto Rico???
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December 9th, 2007 at 4:26 am
Alicia & Brad:
They do have Craig’s list but no one really uses is. There are a few legitimate things on there but it is mostly spam.
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December 9th, 2007 at 7:09 am
Craigslist isn’t used much here… people prefer the local sites like endi.com and clasificadosonline.com
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December 11th, 2007 at 9:27 am
I would have suggested some kick-ass doggie kennels.
CanineCribs anyone?
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December 11th, 2007 at 6:25 pm
Robert – clasificadosonline.com is a great resource. That’s were Stefan has been searching for trucks for the past 6 – 8 month.
Bulbboy – We built Kuta a dog house of the remaining hard wood, but he didn’t like the lack of traction. So we tore it down…;)
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February 2nd, 2009 at 10:22 pm
Doesn’t that just piss you off? (Overages)
But to your advantage all that wood looks absolutely great! You are doing a good job
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August 2nd, 2009 at 4:13 am
Who was responsible for measuring for your material?! I’m an installer and it sounds like someone screwed you unless you measured it your self. I always offer to re-measure for my customers if they haven’t already purchased, on top of the fact that I bill by the square foot so I gotta have the measurement. Also, it is a good idea to have some extra material on hand even a couple hundred feet. Wood ages and it has a chemical in the cells that turns yellow So if you have to do a repair in the future your wood will all be the same age. It also has an enemy known as water. It sounds like you are doing a lot of work on the house, someone pierces a water pipe creating a slow leak and you get up the next morning and find that you have to tear out water damaged material you’ll be glad you didn’t build yourself a living room suite out of the extra wood. Hold onto it or sell off enough for a small room that someone else needs done and just hold on to part of it but you have more options what you are doing with it.
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August 2nd, 2009 at 5:46 am
yup, you hit the nail right on the head. We are ‘do it yourselfers’…ya know, to save money
Thanks for the feedback!
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August 20th, 2009 at 7:51 pm
how is the wood and has the wood hold up my the beach, me and my wife what to put in hardwood floor in but we think with the weather in puerto rico is a bad thing to do tell me is thw floor holding up thanks Daniel
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September 15th, 2009 at 11:00 pm
@Daniel
The floors are holding up great. Really, the only thing that has damaged them is sliding furniture across them. We have felt pads on most things to avoid the scratches, but sometimes they fall off. If you get the right wood, it will hold up fine in Puerto Rico.
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