Hard floors versus carpets

Kahrs engineered wooden floors throughout downstairs (hall ,dining room, kitchen which extends into conservatory, downstairs loo)except for lounge which is carpeted . Put down 14 years ago and could be stripped up to three times. Will have hall done this year when we redecorate, as it has reached that stage . Would consider doing living room but its big and the carpet is ok for now .Would probably have a rug in there(it's N facing) but don't bother elsewhere and we don't find it cold . Wood retains heat ,especially in the kitchen/conservatory and dining room which have SE aspect . We use our dining room as a study and have put wooden mats under desk chairs to stop skidding as well as damage.
Karndean wood- look laminate in bathroom and smallest bedroom which we used to use as a study .
.We don't find wooden floors noisy though we do tend to walk around in bare feet

.Carpet stairs ,landing and other bedrooms

.We did it partly to cut down dust as DH suffers from eczema and asthma .But I love the look, even though they are a bit battered and the original honey colour has faded a bit in parts. I think they still look better than a 14 year old carpet would do in high traffic areas Easy to clean- hoover on wood setting and, you aren't supposed to, I steam mop every couple of weeks. .Our cats do skid around a bit on them ...

Carpet in two of our bedrooms and on stairs/landing.
Slate tiles in kitchen, bathroom and porch.
Everywhere else is good quality laminate (down 15 years and only one scratch) which has survived dgc etc....

SugarpuffFairy - we have a lot of hard flooring in our semi. Also our ds3 who lives in the other attached semi has fully hard flooring. He and his dw don't take off their shoes indoors and we never hear them or their two very large lively dogs. He never hears us (we also wear our shoes indoors.
Perhaps it is as mentioned by a pp, something to do with the quality of the underfloor cushioning.

Got rid of carpets downstairs years ago had floorboards sanded and sealed and wish I had done it earlier. It is so much easier to keep clean. Just a warning about laminate it is dangerous when wet. We had it in the hall and landing and coming out of the bathroom to answer the phone I slipped and broke my wrist. A&E nurse said they had a lot of laminate accidents.

I do like the look of some laminate floors but would never have it myself. When we moved into this house the ground floor was covered in it. Creaky, noisy horrible stuff. We pulled it up more or less straightaway. DH rewarded with a hernia for his efforts! Pure bliss when the carpet was fitted. The bathroom and kitchen are Karndean. (Our last house had a fairly large kitchen which had Lino. Our poor spaniel would skid in there so we put a large rug down for her, much safer!)

Every year we go on holiday with our two dogs to somewhere with wooden floors. Oh, the joy of getting home and not hearing the click, click of dog claws following me around ?!!. We have light fitted carpets in the house, but the dogs always come through the tiled utility room, and know they are going to have their feet dried before they are allowed into the tiled kitchen, so we don't have problems with mud from them. DGC are used to taking their shoes off when they go into their own home, so always take their shoes off when they come in here. Carpet still looks good after 10 years

Wood varnished floors on the first floor bedrooms, with scatter rugs.

Tiled on the ground floor, with some rugs except where there is underfloor heating. It is so much easier to keep clean and can still look homely with soft furnishings and rugs.

At our home all rooms except the living room had laminate tiles. The living room had carpet. In my opinion both has it's own pros and cons. carpet is difficult to clean and gets damaged by water and can get easily stained. While the problem with laminate flooring is that it cannot be sanded or refinished. If you buy good quality carpets then it would be durable and easy to maintain. We usually buy carpets and area rugs from Surplus ( www.surplusfurniture.com/ )

We have carpet upstairs ( except in the bathroom ) The stairs are carpeted and so is the living room. The hall and all other rooms have Oak Karndean. Which is expensive but extremely hard wearing.

Our son had bad asthma growing up so all the carpets had to go. I have a mixture of tiles in Kitchen, bathroom, utility and oak flooring in other rooms. The oak is lovely and warm to walk on and dogs have no problems with our floors. The flooring suits our old cottage and I would not go back to carpets with pets in the house.

So easy to maintain, even when grandchildren forget to take their wellies off, and the oak looks great as it ages. Babies accidents, food dropped all easily coped with.

Rubysong I am told that the correct thing to use to fill in the spaces is sawdust mixed with some kind of glue but not sure which . Perhaps google it ?

Hard floors all the way for me. We have three dogs and a cat and they all manage well. We have a mixture of laminate and tiles. There is some slight marking on the laminate but then carpets get stained too. After cleaning my hard floors I am so glad all that all that dirt is not going into a carpet, so unhygienic. I would never revert back to carpets now.

We have carpet in all the bedrooms, landing and stairs, lounge and study. Ceramic tiles throughout the kitchen, hall and front porch. A lovely smoky wood effect laminate in bathroom and toilet. The downstairs loo and passage has Amtico, slate effect, which has worn extremely well. I like the look of hard wood floors, but like the cosiness of carpet. As I am not that good a housewife, ? the carpet 'hides' the need to de-fluff the floors, for longer than a hard floor, where you can see 'dust bunnies' collect. Sorry Christinefrance, I must be unhygienic, but I like my carpets.

Saw a post I wrote 2 years ago on this - and nothing's changed in our house except we now have MORE grandchildren and the carpets are getting worse by the day. I'd love for a magic wand and have wooden floors laid as it's all the junk that's on the floors that would have to be moved plus the furniture that's off putting. I think I'm basically idle and DH is all for a quiet life. Perhaps next year....

Does anyone have floorboards in rooms above a basement? Is it cold? We are moving soon to a Victorian terrace and are contemplating the carpet/floorboards/laminate dilemma

I have a wooden floor over a basement - well a cellar, actually, some of it unfinished and all very cold, and damp in places. The underneath of the floorboards was visible from down below.

The ground floor is carpeted, apart from kitchen and bathroom. A few years before DH took ill, we insulated all the ceilings in the cellar (DIY, of course, DH never "got a man in") with those rolls of fibreglass (the kind in a plastic tube, not the ones that shed fibreglass fibres on you whenever you touch them) It fitted between the beams that supported the floorboards above. We noticed an improvement in fuel bills and cosyness after that. It is expensive to let the heat spread down into the basement and the ground below it!

There was going to be plasterboard over the insulated ceiling, but we never got round to that.

They can go together. At my home I have a carpet in the living room (ArtRelief, beautiful, with Swarovski crystals), and wood. They really go very well with each other, and it is easy to clean up.

violet489 how did you come across this post? the last reply was in October 2016!

There is flooring which is a cross between laminate and cushion floor, which looks fabulous. I assume it must be easier to fit, too
I have laminate in my lounge and hall, and with hindsight wish I had gone for cushion floor as its quieter and warmer.
It'd be lovely not to sound like Michael Flatley riverdancing every time I walk around my flat.

we've just decided to put hard floors in the bedrooms,we have it it the kichen/diner/family space and in bathrooms and its great but I wont put it in the sitting room as I listen to a lot of music and a hard floor ruins the accoustics so its carpet until I either stop listening to my massive collection of music or go deaf

I'm thinking of having wood instead of carpet - ours is showing its age and the moths have been at it quite badly. We have the same carpet all through downstairs except kitchen and loo. I used to prefer carpet as cosier and not noisy, but am beginning to change my mind - especially with very little gdcs visiting!

Dd recently had a kitchen extension and has had honey coloured wood laid right through, from the front door right through to the end of the extension. It looks lovely and is so much easier to keep clean - and a lot less dust for baby grandson who's had respiratory problems. Mind you the carpets she had before were from the previous owner - house was extremely dated so they'd have gone eventually anyway.

Wood does look lovely but needs more care than carpet.
Very difficult to lay wooden floors if you have concrete base downstairs.

We have oiled wood floor downstairs and the only upkeep is regular vacuuming, occasional damp wipe, and (very) occasional re oil. Ours has only been re oiled once in 8 years! There is insulation under the floor, so not cold or noisy.

This is the latest in long line of reasons why we've got wooden floors.
Another reason , I walk around bare foot and that feels so much better than carpets.
Picture was taken in bedroom where we do have carpet, softer landings if you know what I mean.

What a cute French bulldog. My son has three.

I have a through lounge and when I was doing it up just a couple of years after I moved in, most of the g.children were pretty young. One end is the dining area and the front end the lounge/sitting part. Did think long and hard as to best way of doing this. Eventually decided on Amtico flooring - top end, looks like parquet - event to the edging. At the time i was working, but was still horrified at what I was spending on this one floor area. from the moment it was finished I have never regretted one penny of the cost. 12 years on it still looks like new - anyone coming into my house for the first time makes comments as to how wonderful it looks. So easy to keep clean -a quick sweep and a mop. I do have rug in the sitting area. When the man was laying it he found out that in my hallway there was the original parquet flooring - fortunately, undamaged. In due course I had that carpet dispenses with and found a company who could match this parquet in the (now) open area which had been under the stairs. They cleaned it all up and it came up so wonderfully, that when i returned home on the evening of the day they finished all I could say was 'Wow'. My galley kitchen joins this and there is a cheaper laminate in there. I would NEVER have proper tiles in the kitchen as they are so cold and also anything that falls breaks!
So, my entire downstairs is so very easy to keep clean and is warm to walk on.
I am seriously considering of taking up the rather old carpet in my bedroom upstairs and replacing that with laminate which could extend into my en-suite. At present that has expensive tiles on the floor in their and is so cold to walk on in the winter.
Would never return to carpets in any main living area.