Pergo, Engineered, or Hard Wood Floors?

Hardwood bamboo! Super durable, sustainable, eco-friendly. That's my choice when we re-do our house. Do you have a lumber liquidators in your area? They seem to have excellent prices. Good luck in your decision!

Hardwood... hands down.

- It adds value to your home
- Is easily maintained
- Lasts for decades to upwards of 100 years
- Can be sanded down and restrained when it's time to sell (if they've gotten bad) instead of having to replace them for a fraction of replace cost.

The finishes they can put on hardwood these days, make them as durable as any other option sans stone. Personally, however, I prefer less durable oil or water finish (depending on which color I want to "pull" from the wood... water pulls browns, oil pulls reds)... because I love the feel on bare feet.

I can't WAIT until we beat up the pergo we have left enough to replace it. (We have about 1/2 hardwood and 1/2 pergo). So far I give it's "life" about 3 more years. It was new when we moved in 2 years ago. Hideous, ugly, plastic feeling (because it is) stuff. Really, it's only one step sideways from linoleum. Our hardwood, however, still has the boys and their skateboards, the dogs, pool water, accidental fridge defrostings, band members and their zillion pound gear all over it the same way the pergo does, and is still gorgeous.

I think it depends on the room/rooms you are putting it in. I put a Pergo-like maple laminate in my kitchen about two years ago. At the time, I considered also putting it in the dining room and living room, but decided to wait until I saw how I liked it in the kitchen. I think it looks fine, but I have been disappointed in some other aspects of it. It is VERY slippery, especially when wet. We have one elderly dog and had two elderly dogs previously. They have a hard time walking on it. It also warps very easily--ours has warped from the steam of the dishwasher. I will probably put hardwood in the living room and dining room in the future. On the positive side, it is very durable, and I don't have to worry about my hockey and baseball-playing boys dropping skates, helmets, bats, etc. It doesn't scratch from the dogs. It is very easy to clean.

If you have the money to spend, I think hardwood floors would be the best way to go, based on the previous poster's input. If not, I would go with the engineered wood (handscraped-look is my favorite). The laminate looks and feels cheap to me. JMO!! Good luck with the remodeling!!

I have brazillian cherry hardwood laminate from costco. STUNNING!
Looks lavish, cannot tell it it is Faux. My friend decided to put it into her entire house. This does not like like cheapo stuff.
check online for costco brazillian cherry :-)

I was a flooring specialist for some years at Lowes. Here's my 2cents. Hardwood is the longest lasting and adds the most value to your house. Pergo is a brand of laminate flooring, although many people call all laminate Pergo. There is a huge difference between the high quality Pergo and Armstrong makes good ones too. If you go the laminate route use the more expensive ones. Engineered is in the same catogory as laminate, you get what you paid for. If you are installing it your self, laminate and click and lock prefab are the easiest. If you are getting it installed and have the money, go with the hardwood. Be sure to shop around and the best prices are often the local guys.

We installed a floor called Bellawoods in our dining room and in my son's bedroom from Lumber Liquadators. It is for high traffic and keeps its shine. We did add an area rug in both rooms. It is guaranteed for 50 years and when cleaned properly, will last a long time. We love it.

FYI: I have hardwood in my entire kitchen and do not like it in the cooking area. It warps when wet and loses its finish easily with all the traffic my kitchen sees. We are going to replace it with ceramic tile as our finances dictate. I would not mind refinishing in the eating area, but my kitchen is such that there is not good cut off point. I will use an area rug under the table when the tile is installed. I have ceramic tile in my laundry room and tea room and love it. It washes easily once it has been sealed properly and it not slipper as first thought. Good Luck.

L.

We have explored all three in detail and have experience with some of them. Laminate floor is cheaper and won't hold up as well but will be easy to tear out and replace if it should get destroyed. Hard wood is your most expensive and can be refinished - which can also get expensive. I would stay away from pre engineered is cheaper but can only be refinished once in its life time. We have 3 dogs and 2 kids and alot of traffic in our house. Wear and tear is going to happen no matter what kind of floor you put in. If the kids are pushing toys on the floor it will leave scratches, moving furniture can scratch - nothing is guarenteed to last forever. Being that the kids are active you may want to consider going laminate now since it is cheaper - like carpet - but gives a nicer look than the real wood. Once the kids are older and life settles down and there is less activity upgrade to hard wood then. We looked at putting hard wood in my 13 year olds room and opted against once we did some scratch tests on it with just her moving her stuff around in her room.

I love my pergo floor, it is also the cheapest I think, we have had them for over 3 years now. We have a dog and two girls and no scratches. We have a vacuum that goes over wood and carpet so its easy to clean. Every other week I use murphys oil soap on them. good luck with whatever you choose.

Our 1920s house still has the original wood floors. They are gorgeous quarter sawn oak. Hardwood is very durable. It even lasted through several years of being rented out prior to us buying it. We had it refinished. I'm not sure how many times prior to that it was refinished but the company that did it said that we may or may not be able to refinish it one more time because at a certain point when you get down to the nails you can't refinish it anymore. I love having hardwood throughout.. I have massive environmental allergies so being able to scrub them clean as opposed to carpeting helps me tremendously.

My only complaints were my kids are young and drop heavy sharp things on the floor which has gouged it wherever we don't have area rugs. My husband dropped an iron on it and took a chunk out. We tried to move our piano and you can see the indentation where the wheels rolled across it. I think the damage of all that would've been worse with laminate but we've never had pergo. You can replace boards that become damaged. We invested in lots of those felt things you put on the bottoms of couch and chair legs to keep them from scratching the floor. Makes it REAL easy to move furniture with those on!

Hardwoods if you can afford it. They are so lovely and they increase the value of your house. So easy to care for too.
I have it in all my house but for the kitchen and baths and love the way they look and feel.
C.

I cleaned houses full time for years, and I can strongly say that Pergo, is not worth buying. It is NOT durable at all. Basically if you plan to walk on it, use the rooms it's in, be ready for it to look like junk in a short amount of time. It's easily scratched, dented, streaked and I've seen it seperate ALOT. I would go for hardwoods if affordable, or other alternatives. The flooring that looks like hardwood, but isn't. Very durable and better for the environment. I would rule the Pergo out, waste of money!