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Hi-we are going to be changing both and laying either an engineered hardwood/prefinished hardwood or laminate. Which would you do first? Floor or moldings? Thanks!
Wood flooring then toe molding (small 1/4 round molding on top of the flooring, against the wall molding). Wood flooring has a small gap/space at the edges for expansion/contraction. Toe molding covers this gap.
One point of disagreement is should the toe molding be the color of the molding or of the flooring. I say the color of the molding.
Even if no toe molding, wood first then molding to cover the gap.
The CPM (Critical Path Method) would be flooring then trim- especially site finished flooring. However, a lot of builders will install prefinished flooring at the end (like when the carpet goes in). This prevents damage to the flooring from the other trades- I have experienced both ways. And from my experience either will work but,
If the trim goes in before the flooring (the prefinished scenario) a flooring installer will usually charge more for his labor because he has to cut door jambs in order to install the flooring correctly.
It is done both ways...except, if you install the baseboard and the door trim first, you have to leave a space for the floor to slide underneath it. If the proposed flooring is 3/4", then the baseboards will be installed 3/4" off the rough floor such that the flooring slides underneath the base board. In order to do this, have a couple of scraps of the proposed flooring, and use them as 'spacers' to get the baseboard/door trim at the right height. In other words, the flooring slides in under the baseboard and the other trim. At the end, you can add a shoe molding which eases the transition from flooring to basebaord. It also covers any gaps between the flooring and the baseboard. The color of the shoe molding can be either the floor or the trim color. I recently installed a floor and used a shoe which is the same color as the flooring, against a white baseboard.
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