Ceramic Tile or Laminate Wood Flooring

[Mike69]

My House has Tile throughout except for the bedrooms. I want to ditch the carpet in the bedrooms but not sure if I should go with a ceramic tile or laminate wood flooring. I don't have any extra pieces of tile & don't think I can get the exact same color to match the rest of the house. That is one of the reason I was leaning towards laminate wood, plus I also like the way it looks. Not sure if it would like weird with 2 different colors of tile. What do you guys recommend???

[robert]

I'd recomend laminate wood over tile as It's gonna be hard t match the tile
and wood in the bedrooms are cool. G/L

[jakesford]

I would go with laminate, at least it is a little warmer on the feet.

[92lxstang]

I just had wood laminate flooring installed in my house this past week. My house is now 100% wood laminate and tile no carpet. So far I like it. Let me know if you need someone to install it for you. I used a father and son that do good work at reasonable prices.

[Back N Black]

We've had laminate in the whole house for 6 years now...absolutely hate it! It sucks to clean damn near all cleaners streak on it. If you have animals or kids be prepared for fluid from accidents getting in the cracks and warping the boards. Dust is craaaazzzzy too. Seems like it attracts it.

[akfodysvn]

I have dogs and spills... never had anything get in the cracks and it's easy as fuck to clean. Run a steamer over it... like a "shark" steamer which is cheap. No need to be using crazy cleaners on laminate IMO, but others may disagree. I dust it(pet hair) and steam it once a week and it's 5x better than a hardwood for pets as it doesn't show any scratches. Not to mention you don't have to worry about the grout looking like crap after awhile.

[unkoricky]

We've had laminate in the whole house for 6 years now...absolutely hate it! It sucks to clean damn near all cleaners streak on it. If you have animals or kids be prepared for fluid from accidents getting in the cracks and warping the boards. Dust is craaaazzzzy too. Seems like it attracts it.

I have laminate throughout my whole house too with 2 dogs that shed like crazy, its no so bad if you actually sweep once a week.

Seems like it has made my house a little cooler, not a big difference but my dogs love it during the summer time. They hate it during the winter time when the floors are cold as hell.

[2K2 LS1]

What all is entailed in tiling a second floor? Like Back N Black I have had laminate floors downstairs for about 5 years and hate it beyond belief. It is time to replace the carpet in the loft and kids bedrooms and we want to do away with carpet all together due to their allergies and asthma. What all has to be done to install tile on a sub-floor? I know it is not as simple as laying the thin set over the sub-lfooring???

[akfodysvn]

tile throughout a home looks cheap unless they are huge travertine pieces. Don't tile your entire second floor, it will turn people away when you want to sell IMO. Sounds like you have good reason w/ the allergies and asthma to not have carpet though.

[ceyko]

Yeah, I'd have to agree - Tile is great in a lot of areas (especially wet areas), but to put it everywhere can be considered a bit overboard.

I'd never tile a bedroom. Wood at the most. It is our personal preference to continue with carpet in bedrooms, but that's just us. A nice wood could look very nice as well.

[dblack1]

What all is entailed in tiling a second floor? Like Back N Black I have had laminate floors downstairs for about 5 years and hate it beyond belief. It is time to replace the carpet in the loft and kids bedrooms and we want to do away with carpet all together due to their allergies and asthma. What all has to be done to install tile on a sub-floor? I know it is not as simple as laying the thin set over the sub-lfooring???

check out john bridge forum, but I will sum it up for you.

For a second story install you will need to know the composition of the floor joists. This will be spacing and the size of the material making up the joist. Secondly, you will want to know what you existing sub floor is. There is a chance the floor structure will not support the tile.

If it will support it you might have to install an additional layer of decking, then use a product called ditra that is thinset to the subfloor. On top of this you will add another layer of thinset and then the tile.

It can cost almost twice as much to install on a wood subfloor as a concrete installation.

For the cost you could install a real hardwood floor and still come out ahead.

[2K2 LS1]

check out john bridge forum, but I will sum it up for you.

For a second story install you will need to know the composition of the floor joists. This will be spacing and the size of the material making up the joist. Secondly, you will want to know what you existing sub floor is. There is a chance the floor structure will not support the tile.

If it will support it you might have to install an additional layer of decking, then use a product called ditra that is thinset to the subfloor. On top of this you will add another layer of thinset and then the tile.

It can cost almost twice as much to install on a wood subfloor as a concrete installation.

For the cost you could install a real hardwood floor and still come out ahead.

I thought there was a thin product you screwed to the subfloor that you then applied the thinset to?

[dblack1]

I thought there was a thin product you screwed to the subfloor that you then applied the thinset to?

That is one way. That is basically concrete in board form, usually 3'x5' sheets.


I've done it both ways. The reason I recommended the other product made by schutler is because it doesn't add nearly as much thickness to the overall installation.

The crete board is around 3/8" thick, the product I mentioned is around 1/8".

If you add the thickness of the tile, thinset, and hardibacker (crete board) you will end up with around over 1" added above the sub floor. Compound this with the possibility that you might have to add another layer of subfloor decking for strength and you could end up with 2" of added height. I have seen this happen on a second floor install.

Tile is one of those things where it can be done many ways, but few of them are the right way. Most of the time when I've seen a poor job on tile it is on a wood subfloor. Concrete is easy.