Flooring rant / project thread

So SWMBO bought a new washer and dryer last weekend that are getting delivered on Friday, so I had to finally get off my butt and figure out redoing the floor in the house. This is the 82 build house I started renting in the fall of 18 and bought last summer from the owner without it hitting the market to take it "as is" knowing all the bad secrets it has. It was a rental for about 10 years and the carpet was trashed and stained. We also have four kids between us and three cats so we wanted a durable, waterproof, hard surface.

We ended up going with LVP flooring and specifically the Smartcore Ultra from Coretec / Lowe's. It has a pad built into the bottom of it and the thickest wear layer.

Well we started here, in the washing room / hallway to the master bedroom and bath.

I think this photo really illustrates the overall status of my life. Anyways, we ripped out the utility sink and vanity cabinet.

Next we ripped up the linoleum and carpet.

This led us to the discovery that hard floors have an underlayment and carpet does not. So we had to go to the store and get 22 sheets of it and rent a flatbed pickup to do it.

Then we could finally start working on making new underlayment floor pieces to go over the sub floor. I had to buy a jigsaw, multi tool, and sander, too.

Meanwhile, were decided to cut back the existing underlayment by 3" to get rid of the water damage and the nails weren't coming out, so I had to dremel them.

My first piece didn't fit because there were too many corners, so I had to cut it in half. Then instead of buying a nail gun I screwed the floor down.

Two days later we have a completed for ready for the stupid LVP planks. Please tell me what I screwed up now before I start putting them down.

Next steps are to repair the walls and paint plus actually laying the LVP down.

I feel ya brother.  I tore up my carpet for hardwood... then had to remove the subfloor to level it... then had to replace all the joists for termite damage... then had to jack up the house and replace the foundation because of that same termite damage....

What started out as a simple hardwood job turned into a new foundation.  Grr.

I've heard before that this is part of the reason many "good" renovators will just strip everything down as far as reasonably possible. It's often easier to go in knowing your going to do everything than it is to say "we're just going to do some flooring." In some cases, this can save a lot of time because there isn't any surprises along the way. It's a great way to bid up the cost of a project.

In reply to pheller :

This is why I'm hoping I can do a complete tear-down and rebuild of my house.  I already know it needs to be torn down to the studs if not further and if I need to go through that much effort (and much $$$$), why not spend a bit more and redesign the house and layout so it can better suite my needs/wants? 

Javelin's pictures are giving me flashbacks of rebuilding the flooring in my ex's kitchen... Did you find any abandoned wells and giant mouse nests?  About the only thing I'd do is remove the door moldings, although I suppose it should be too hard to cut the molding to fit the flooring.  The ex- wanted all new molding so we gutted everything.

Three guys over two eight hour days finished my floors.  They mudded the low spots, nailed the squeaky spots, added wood to the holes, used a diamond blade on a 6” grinder with vacuum attachment to make them real flat.  Looked like a lot of work, now I have nice floors and an very satisfied in my decision to pay $2/ft for installation.

We did our floors as our "Quarantine" project and working mostly weekends we put down just under 1000 sf of the Pergo Waterproof laminate.  It took about a month and a half.  It was a learning experience for sure, and I don't know that i would want to lay so much again but it really is not that difficult.

The only thing I would do, mostly because I'm paranoid about washing machines that are not sitting on a concrete floor near a floor drain, is add a catch basin under the washer with a drain plumbed into it.  

In reply to Streetwiseguy :

The new washers are too big for the drain pans these days, we asked about that.

700+ sq ft of vinyl went in last month.  We paid a guy to do it.  I don't have the patience, drive or desire to do it myself.  I did do a Pergo about 10+ years ago to an old condo and vowed to never install it myself again.  

Click-lock vinyl plank is definitely not bad to install. I just finished about 1200sf worth in my new house, though being new construction I stretched the work out over a couple weeks. The brand I used had some trouble fully locking together sometimes, so I had to learn how much I could tap it with a hammer before I damaged the tongue and groove. My concrete slab turned out to be unfortunately lumpy and overall not flat, but the vinyl plank definitely covers the imperfections and the combined weight of the assembled flooring is enough to make it lay down tight to the subfloor and not "bubble" over imperfections.

Don't let the pros with the fancy cutter fool you, all you really need is a box cutter and a speed square. Score the top surface of the plank using the speed square to get a straight line, then snap it along the line and cut again through the underlayment layer. Quick and clean. 

Not that you don't have material selected already, but having DIYed a couple different options in click together and one in glue together, I found gluing to be easiest/fastest for someone who is not doing this all the time.

Just read my flooring thread

You'll feel much better about your own floor problems.