To Refinish Or Not To Refnish?

That is the question when it comes to finding old wood floors in a Tacoma Craftsman.

I recently had a lovely tenant of almost 3 years move out of a room for rent and when she moved I did what I probably should have done when I bought the house, rip out the old carpet. It was shag and had been spared when I bought the home in 2016 and ripped out all the carpet upstairs (more on that below). So it was time.

Upon pulling back the carpet I started to have flashbacks…it was the same original wood floors that I had found upstairs 5+ years ago. I started to think about the hours I spent on my hands and knees pulling up staples and carpet tacks with joy thinking once that task was done it was on to the the satisfaction of sanding and staining floors. That excitement disappeared when it was finally time to hit them with the drum sander and the smell of burning latex emanated the house. The sand paper on the drum, gunked up with paint, didn’t put a dent in the 7 layers of latex (and probably lead) paint that had beeb applied in the decades since the house was built in 1900. My dad insisted that I just put new carpet in at the time. Instead I went to home depot, bought about 4 gallons of paint stripper, and got on my hands and knees for a real life game of “the floor is lava” (that stuff burns).

It was miserable, but we pressed on, determined and in too deep. After finally getting all the paint up we were able to sand, stain, and finish. After 60+ hours of work in the 90 degree heat of August and 40 hours of vacation taken, they were complete. It was a lot of work but super rewarding and they looked fantastic.

Old Paint Stripped Away and thrown in a bucket

Here’s the thing though. They echoed like crazy. When I started renting out rooms in the house I quickly wished that I had just left the carpet in or put in something else like laminate or vinyl plank. The original wood being cedar meant it was a softwood rather then a hardwood. Softwood is often found in early 20th century homes in tacoma, pine and cedar are considered softwoods. They look great, but they scratch and dent easily. Not great for pets or rentals. Soon I was finding dimples from high heels and scratches from dressers.

This is all why I choose to not refinish downstairs!

With all things considered I decided to install Luxury Vinyl Plank (LVP) over the existing softwood cedar floors. I still pulled all the staples and tacks out, but no paint stripper this time. To help with sound dampening I installed a 10mm underlayment before starting with the LVP. Everything is “floated” meaning you don”t tack or glue any of the materials down. This has the added benefit of preserving the original Cedar floors for the future, in case I ever wanted to refinish the home in its original light for resale.

The house is quirky already, brightly colored rooms, cedar floors upstairs, wood shaker cabinets in the kitchen. It’s a furnished rental so it plays towards the quirky side of things, no need for uniformity here. Because of this I decided to blend 3 shades of LVP randomly for a unique look. Finish it off with 1/2”x4” square trim and a fresh coat of white trim print and you get a nice update from the shag look and something that will last for years.