It seems like the style right now is to move from Carpet flooring to hard surface flooring. If you asked most people what their most desirable hard surface flooring was, they would reply with “hardwood”. However, a lot of budgets do not allow for the expense of real hardwood floors, therefore we look for alternatives. This is where laminate and vinyl flooring come into play. If you do not know the difference between the two, we will explain that in this blog, and help you decide if laminate or vinyl flooring will work best for you!
Many people look to laminate as their automatic product of choice. While recently vinyl has been creeping up with many products that would directly compete with laminate. One thing many people enjoy with laminate is that when you walk on it, it is a very hard surface. This makes it possible to give a more realistic “hardwood” look and feel.
Vinyl, on the other hand, is not quite as hard, but it is slightly flexible. The flexibility of vinyl makes it more forgiving to scratches or dents. One major difference between the two types of flooring is that laminate cannot be around moisture; due to laminate being made from compressed pieces of wood, if it is around moisture it will puff up and you will have to replace it. On the contrary, Vinyl is NOT affected at all by water, since it is essentially made from plastic.
Every home is very different; no one flooring option is right for everyone. So if you are looking for a wood look and have no issues with moisture, laminate flooring would probably be the way to go. If you are putting some in a bathroom, or a kitchen, or anywhere that you could have moisture, then vinyl flooring would be the best consideration.
For more information on this topic, or any other flooring question, please contact
USA Flooring at 724.548.7844.