Love & Renovations

· 33 Comments

Installing Luxury Vinyl Plank Flooring

DIY Projects

When Corey and I first moved into our current house, we loved the charming feel of it, the (manageable but significant) amount of love it clearly needed, and how fresh and clean it felt for a home that was over twenty years old.

Then, we brought in our three dogs.

And a few years later, a baby.

We were all able to co-exist with the house for a while, and we even reached a point lately where we felt good about the progress we’ve made and have been moving pretty slowly with changes to the home. There weren’t any pressing situations, and we felt good about how things were looking. But. We had a few things brewing that added up to disaster. We had…

– Decade-old (at least) carpet.
– Three dogs
– A doggy door
– A backyard. With dirt.
– Rain (an unfathomable amount of rain, it seemed).
– A baby who is getting ready to learn how to crawl.

Do you know what happens when you add all of those ingredients together? You know what, don’t guess, I’ll just tell you.

MUD.

Mud. That’s what happens. All over my house. Everywhere.

I tried to clean the carpet. I really did. For what felt like hours. And then? One of the dogs needed to go outside. And it started all over.

So instead of cleaning the carpet, we decided to get rid of it.

Would you believe that this flooring costs under $2 per square foot? And that's it's VINYL? This stuff is absolutely incredible, and you won't believe how simple it is to install.

Would you believe that this flooring costs under $2 per square foot? And that's it's VINYL? This stuff is absolutely incredible, and you won't believe how simple it is to install.

Mmmmm. Yeah, that’s much better.

This is the same flooring we used in Jackson’s room – just plain old vinyl plank flooring. Peel and stick, y’all. And I love it. It’s durable, it’s easy to lay down, and I don’t have to stress when the dogs scratch it up because it’s cheap. And it looks fantastic, to boot.

I won’t detail the process (because I already did that here), but I will add that it was slightly different than it was upstairs, since we have concrete subfloors down here. It just meant a little more cleaning/sanding and we had to fill in some holes from the carpet tacks, but other than that it was the same basic idea!

Would you believe that this flooring costs under $2 per square foot? And that's it's VINYL? This stuff is absolutely incredible, and you won't believe how simple it is to install.

Would you believe that this flooring costs under $2 per square foot? And that's it's VINYL? This stuff is absolutely incredible, and you won't believe how simple it is to install.

And now?

Would you believe that this flooring costs under $2 per square foot? And that's it's VINYL? This stuff is absolutely incredible, and you won't believe how simple it is to install.

I don’t have to stress about nasty, stained, smelly carpet in my dining room. And really, in the end, it was either the carpet or the dogs. Lucky for them, we found this stuff.

I’m so excited that I no longer have to worry that Jackson will just be rolling around in mud whenever I want to lay him on the floor, and it’s a much quicker process for me to get everything cleaned up now when the dogs inevitably track in nastiness. Another fun side effect of the new flooring is that my house instantly smells cleaner without the musty old carpet. And, it’s hard to describe it exactly, but the air even feels cleaner now!

I’m all about a solution that makes my house look, feel, and smell cleaner on a daily basis with zero extra effort on my part.

So far, I can’t recommend luxury vinyl plank flooring enough. It’s incredibly affordable, it looks fantastic, and it’s beyond simple to install. I cannot wait to bring this flooring throughout the rest of our house, and banish carpet from my life forever!

Reader Interactions

Comments

  1. Jessica says

    Hi! I’m just wondering how it holds up to dog slipping? Our dogs slip on our laminate like CRAZY!! We’re thinking of installing this over it for a temp (or permanent fix).

    Thank you!

    Reply

    • Amanda says

      We’ve never had an issue with it, and we’ve always had big dogs! I think the more texture options (like this one) are more resistant to slipping than the smooth ones.

      Reply

  3. Hannah says

    Hi!

    We are about to take the plunge and rip out our old carpet, but I’m very worried about what we will find underneath.

    Did you all have any issues with the concrete being unlevel when you installed your new flooring?

    Thanks!

    Reply

    • Amanda says

      Yes and no. The flooring in our house is definitely not completely level – I think that’s not terribly uncommon. However, we haven’t had any issues with the flooring because of that. Really, the only time I notice that the floor isn’t level is if I set something round on certain parts of the floor and it rolls away, haha. Good luck!

      Reply

  8. Kristy says

    This looks awesome and has inspired my husband and I to do this in our kitchen. Where did you buy your plank flooring and what color?

    Reply

    • Amanda says

      I use Mrs. Meyer’s All Purpose cleaner for my mop – I like the lemon scent! I use combination of a regular spray mop (I have just a random, off-brand spray mop, similar to a Swiffer) for everyday cleaning and a steam mop (I like the Bissel PowerFresh mop!) for when I want it really clean!

      Reply

  10. Andrea says

    What a difference!! I think if anyone has pets, if you can afford it carpets have to go! There are exceptions however, my mother recently removed all their carpet and put in wood flooring and their pet bunny won’t put a paw on it.They have to lay out a path of rugs so he can get around the house and feel safe:). I have to add I never would have known your flooring was laminate:).

    Reply

  11. Violet Colindale says

    Oh, I do know from personal experience how hard it is to maintain the perfect condition of a carpet. Especially if you have pets. And if you have 3 dogs and a baby it is hard to find time even to wash your hair not to mention the cleaning. So I think you did the right thing at the right time.

    Reply

  12. Sarah says

    We did this same thing about 18 months ago — put down laminate and got rid of out nasty living room carpet — when my daughter was 5 months old. It’s sooooo much nicer. You are going to love it more and more!

    Reply

  15. missamysmiles says

    It looks absolutely amazing!

    We just bought our first home in December, and it had nasty nasty nasty carpet throughout the whole house. It’s one thing if the nasty carpet is because of you and your family, and another when it dates to the 1970s and other people’s nasty. So… it had to go before we moved in.

    We got laminate flooring that actually looks very similar to yours, and did the whole don’t pay thing with Home Depot (which we just paid off this month – yippee!).

    The one thing that I will warn you about… since I also have a dog, is that that colour of flooring shows dirt really quick. It’s a constant battle to keep it looking clean. We have to sweep 2 times a day to keep up with it, and it still looks messy 5 minutes later. Every time I go to complain though, I think about living with carpets previously and am thankful that I can see the dirt and hair versus it living deep in nasty nasty carpetville!

    Reply

    • Amanda says

      Thank you! Congrats on getting yours paid off! I was worried about ours looking dirty too. We’ve been pretty pleasantly surprised so far with it looking pretty clean, though. Most of what gets tracked into our house is dirt so it just blends right in…but I walk around barefoot a lot and get very bothered by dirty floors on my feet, and these floors bother me less than the laminate in the kitchen! I’ve found as long as I sweep every other day or so, it stays pretty clean.

      Reply

  17. Kary says

    That looks amazing! We have 3 large dogs and a 13 month old so that might work for us too, what brand/color did you use? We have the laminate wood flooring now but it’s starting to look scratched up and is so hard to keep clean. How do you clean yours?

    Reply

    • Amanda says

      Thanks! It’s Style Selections brand from Lowe’s – the box doesn’t have the color name, but if I remember right it’s Antique Woodland Oak. I am able to keep mine pretty clean with a quick sweep every other day or so, and then I mop using Mrs. Meyer’s cleaner once a week (or more, if it’s been a muddy week!) I’ve been pleasantly surprised with how clean they look, even if I miss a few days of cleaning.

      Reply

  19. Corinne says

    WOW! That looks great! I have to admit, after your first post about the vinyl plank flooring, I’ve been looking into it myself for my entire upstairs living area. The current carpet definitely rivals yours! It’s the original carpet….from when the house was built in 1991. The people I bought the house from let their tiny little dog take care of its business EVERYWHERE inside and did a poor job cleaning up after their dog…..which meant when I moved in four years ago, my little dog was able to smell it and would then do her business over it before I could catch her. Potty training Min Pins is hard enough without that problem! My questionable carpet when from bad to worse pretty fast! Can’t wait to change things up like you did!

    Reply

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I'm Amanda, he's Corey. We live in the suburbs of Austin, Texas with our two sons and we love to chat about our home and the projects we're working on. We hope you find inspiration here! Click here to learn more about us.