Rugs, Carpets and Carpeting - carpet and trim

Easy question (I hope), I am putting carpet in a room with trim that I plan on removing soon. Should I remove the trim and have the carpet layed flush to the walls or should I leave the trim and lay the carpet flush to the trim and then remove and replace the trim at a later date?

If you have a water leak mishap in the future, your going to trash the carpet trying to pull it from out under the baseboards.

I would replace the baseboards and leave them raised 3/8" off the subfloor for carpet tucking purposes. Paint them, then install the carpet. Then minimal touch up without a chance of really making a mess later.

Unfortunately installing the new baseboard trim prior to installing the carpet is not an option. There is no running water in the room so I do not believe that future water damage would be an issue. Your suggestion of laying the baseboard 3/8" above the floor to leave room to tuck the carpet leads me to believe that the trim should be layed on top of the carpet rather than laying the trim flush to the floor and then the carpet flush to the trim. I've asked several people the same question and the consensus is about 50% / 50% as to what they would do. Am I correct to assume that how the trim and carpet meet is a matter of taste or is there a right way and a wrong way?

Do whatever you want to do. I'm just thinking about the poor installer that has to pull up the carpet upon the next installation. They are going to have to pull the baseboards in order to get the carpet up. Sounds like more money to be made by the installer, or a piss poor installation next time.

True, it does look better if you have the effect of the baseboards sitting on top of the carpet. Also with the custom milling on trim these days going into homes, if you put the trim on the subfloor, the carpet hides the milling you paid extra for.