Flooring for Florida livingroom, diningroom, familyroom, and foyer (vinyl, laminate, hardwood floors)
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Both, the house is in Florida and has a very open floor plan. The woodwork is painted white, white kitchen cabinets, ceramic tile in the kitchen, which adjoins these other spaces. I was thinking hardwood floors, but then someone told me that isn't practical for Florida. I don't really like walking on ceramic tiles becaue they always feel cold to me, so I didn't want to go that direction. Then radiant floor heating was suggested, but I don't think I need that in Florida. Any suggestions are welcome as I am not up to date with all of the new materials out there. Thanks.
being a former floridian yes you can use hardwood flooring I had neighbors who had hardwood flooring and never had a problem with that . It depends on where in florida you have the house in the north yes you will need that heat furthere south no you wont . ceramic tiles are easier to care for such as sweeping and moping . Good luck to you whatever you decide .
I'm in Florida and I am going with hardwood in the living and dining rooms (currently it's wall-to-wall). We have ceramic in the foyer which seamlessly flows through the hall into the kitchen and into our Florida room. Our family room has a laminate wood floor and that will stay as is. The bedrooms have wall-to-wall which will also stay.
Many people have wood floors here: hardwood, engineered, laminate. The only reason I can think of for why wood wouldn't be practical is if the homeowner never ran the AC in the hot and humid summer.
Unless you live directly on the beach and track a lot of sand into the house, which would be abrasive to the finish, wood flooring or laminate is fine down here. We have ceramic tile in kitchen and bathrooms and the horrible original sheet vinyl in the laundry room and wood everywhere else and we love the wood, even though it does seem to require a bit more cleaning effort than the tile does.
Install can be a bit fussier if you're putting it in over slab. Our slab is well above grade so we don't have the moisture issues some have, but they did have to do a good amount of grinding/leveling in order to get the slab level enough to get the flooring to go in right. And engineered is often more encouraged because of those slab and moisture issues than plank flooring is. Just make sure you go with an engineered with a reasonably thick top layer that will allow for multiple refinishes.
I live in Central Florida, and there is sand everywhere here.
I have tile and hardwood on my own home, no carpet whatsoever. When we moved into this house, we removed the carpet immediately. There must have been 5 pounds of sand just in the foyer, maybe 25 pounds throughout the rest of the house, it was awful!
I usually advise my clients to do hardwood or tile in the heavy traffic areas of the house, and save the carpet for the bedrooms, where there is less likelihood of sand being tracked in.
In tiled and wood floored areas, I always use large area rugs to cut down on echoing.
Oh, radiant heating? Chances are, you are going to have a monolithic foundation, so you are not going to need radiant floor heaters.
I have friends in Lake County with ceramic tile that seems very cold in the winter. A little further south in Polk county another couple of friends have a "look alike" hardwood flooring that is a vinyl style, it never seems cold underfoot. There are ways to add floor heat that are just in your more heavily used areas. You can designate where you want the pads to be placed, say along the counter areas of bathrooms and kitchens.
I am buying a house in south east florida and need advice on flooring. The house was built in 2003 on a monolithic slab. There is carpeting in the bedrooms and we have allergies so we want to take it out. The soil is sandy and we do not live on or near the beach, it is just sandy everywhere between I95 and the ocean. The living and bath areas have large light colored tile.
I like the wood look for the bedrooms but I am concerned the sand will eventually get tracked in and the floors will scratch. I looked at HD and Lowes and the laminates and "hardwoods" look like the top is very thin and did not notice much of a clear finish to protect the wood. Other than ceramic/porcelain that will work well will vinyl hold up over time. I heard of a new leather look vinyl tile that looks great. We have no dogs but will be using our rear yard to entertain and I know sand will track in.
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Florida Flooring
