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Good morning all. I'm requesting a little advice. Here's my situation. I live in a four story townhouse. Bottom floor is the kitchen, 2nd floor is the living room and half bath, 3rd floor are two bedrooms and small landing, and the top floor is the master bedroom and full bath. The kitchen has white tile, the 2 bathrooms have lamitate, and the rest of the house has berber carpeting, stairwells and all. A few years ago I bought a surplus of engineered hardwood flooring from a coworker at a ridiculously low price because it was just sitting in his garage. They are 3" x 3/8" planks, pecan cherry, or something like that. My father and I used the engineered hardwood for the second floor living rood. We glued it down. It still looks good. The only weird thing is that the first floor kitchen is tile, stairs up to the living room is berber carpeting, and the second floor is this engineered hardwood.
I've recently gone through a refinance and got a little money back. Around $1800. I decided to put this money back into my house since that's the reason why I received the money in the first place. I've decided to place hardwoods on all 3 stairwells (7 steps each) as well as the landings/hallways at the third floor and the fourth floor. I think I have enough engineered hardwood material left over (around 120 sq. ft.) to accomplish this. I would have to hire a contractor to do the work. I'm down to two contractors and here is the work and prices they quoted me.
Contractor #1. Will use the engineered hardwood I already have for the stairs and landings. $900 Labor. $900 to buy the stair nosing for each step, possibly purchase more engineered hardwood in case I am short at $6.99 a sq. ft. Have to purchase the material for the risers which is still unknown at this point. So right now, I'm at $1,800 without the risers and may possibly need more engineered hardwood.
Contractor #2. Will use my engineered hardwood on the 2 landings (will definitely have enough material), will use solid wood and stain to match my engineered hardwood, install 3 total bull noses (at each transition). Install all the risers. Cost is $2,075 total, labor includes. This cost includes all material (stairs, risers, bullnose)
Which would you choose? Is solid wood better than engineered hardwood on stairs? Thanks.
Solid wood has the advantage of being able to be refinished more time since there is actually more wood. You'll probably not be able to tell much of difference between the two when you put them down. I'd wait until you get all the information needed to get a complete quote on the first one.
Right now I would go for the second contractor because his quote seems more complete.
Thank you. I have a feeling they will cost about the same, or the engineered hardwood would cost a little more, which is strange since I thought I would save money using my own flooring material.
We just did our stairs but it was a DIY project. So I cant comment on a contractor price but do want to mention mixing the two materials. We actually had a difficult time matching Engineered wood to the hardwood treads we purchased. I have two landings that I wanted to use engineered wood on. My reason being I was pretty wiped out with staining and putting poly on the treads. It was taking a long time to do and I was kind over the whole thing by the 3rd week. Even though I stained the treads a common walnut color, the engineered stuff had a much duller finish and the stain on them didn't seem as deep or true as the hardwood. The grain on the hardwood really showed through where the engineered stuff did not. I cant really explain it properly but the two together looked off. I am no novice to hardwood refinishing but just wanted to point out what we ran into. So we bought unfinished hardwood flooring for the landing, stained it and put it down. I also felt that the extra coats of poly we put on was a good choice since I have dogs and wanted to maintain the finish as long as possible, since in general stairs take a beating. The engineered flooring seemed to have just one coat of poly on them. You would know better than I how the finish is holding up though. Good luck on whatever you decide. I personally hate carpet on stairs. its a pain to vacuum and gets dirty so fast!
I've priced out steps before just for the treads and they cost anywhere from $35-40 per tread. I'd guess material-wise the cost would range from $700-1,100. Usually labor is at minimum, equal to the cost of materials so it looks like a good price. My guess is that a contractor will be able to better match the color since they do it all the time.
I've priced out steps before just for the treads and they cost anywhere from $35-40 per tread. I'd guess material-wise the cost would range from $700-1,100. Usually labor is at minimum, equal to the cost of materials so it looks like a good price. My guess is that a contractor will be able to better match the color since they do it all the time.
Whoa. What type of wood? Ours cost 17.98 each for red oak.
To answer the question- contractor #2.
He obviously understands stairs and stair code.
If you use the engineered flooring over the current treads, you'll throw off the rise at the first and last steps. By replacing the current treads the contractor can keep the rise/run correct- finishing is just a matter of matching stain and finish.
This is also a good time to add any reinforcements to stringers if needed and also eliminate any squeaks that maybe present.
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