Medium oak is a great color for floors as it provides a good neutral backdrop to show off the rest of your furniture and soft furnishings. Solid oak hardwood flooring can be expensive however, so you may need to look for something with a lower price tag. Oak laminate flooring is one option which you might like to consider. If you choose right you will have the look of solid wood without the high cost. There are a few things to avoid however when it comes to choosing laminate flooring that you might not be aware of.

1. Avoid Cheap Laminate

Cheap laminate flooring is one of the nasties that is hated in the interior design world. It looks like plastic that has had a wood pattern printed on it and it feels like plastic underfoot. It has a kind of hollow ring to it. You are also likely to find the surface wearing thin after a very short time and also some places where it peels away to reveal the backing. Avoid this kind of laminate like the plague. Instead pay a little more for laminate that looks like the real thing and which has a firm wooden backing and a tongue and groove click fitting mechanism so that it looks just like real solid wood flooring.

2. Avoid Buying Too Little

Make a proper estimate for how much flooring you need so that you avoid buying too much flooring, but also make sure that you allow a little contingency of around ten per cent of the floor area and don’t buy too little. If your estimate is close to a whole number of packs then buy another at the same time as long as you can return it. There is nothing more irritating than running out of the material you need to complete a job when you are just about to finish it.

3. Avoid Paying Too Much

Although you should not buy cheap laminate there is nothing to stop you looking for discounts on quality laminate flooring. Look for the well-known brands, which are often available online and in local stores at a discount, or buy at sale time when you can often get substantial reductions of ten per cent or more.

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Last Modified : January 12th, 2010 Filed under : Furniture Navigate : Previous post / Next post