Designing Kitchens and Bathrooms - Hardwood vs. Laminate Floors Q's.

Hello everyone.

I'm thinking about putting wooden floors in my room and saw some alternative methods today while browsing the aisles of Home Depot. They now offer laminate and vinyl flooring which looks and feels really close to the real thing, for half the price! But I'm sure you already knew this :)

Anyway, I'm just wondering if any of you know of anyone else (or yourself perhaps) that has either done laminate or vinyl flooring in their home and what their experiences were? I currently have carpet in my room and wondering if I'll have to worry about making sure the floor is leveled or not.

I know that both laminate and vinyl floors can be done by yourself but the real wooden floors require more man power. But yeah, let me know if you can share anything on this cuz I wanna make my purchases sometime this weekend.

Thanks!

Welcome to the forums! Laminate floors fall closer to the diy project type than do 3/4" hardwood. Don't get me wrong, you can install full hardwood, but, like you said, it takes more horsepower. Personally I like the feel and the finish of full hardwood flooring. I have installed both, and customers like the quickness of the install of the laminates (so do I). So until you walk on a sample of both in an existing room, you won't really be able to tell which you want. Laminates = quick but thin. Full thickness hardwood = firm, lotta work, special tools.