4 Signs It’s Time To Have Your Hardwood Floors Refinished
If you’re looking to invest in your Chicago home, it is tough to find something that can pay off quite as well as new hardwood flooring. Hardwood flooring can last you for a lifetime, but to do so, will require a bit of care and regular maintenance from time to time. If you’re familiar with hardwood flooring, you know that they are going to need to be sanded and refinished again at some point or another, but most homeowners aren’t sure how often this needs to be done. Fortunately, there are some signs that you can be on the lookout for that will help to clue you in as to when your hardwood flooring requires care. While some of these signs are somewhat obvious, others might be harder to notice, especially if you aren’t sure that you should be looking out for them, to begin with. To help you in this effort, our team of Chicago hardwood flooring professionals has taken the time to put together this shortlist of signs that you can be on the lookout for that will help you recognize when it’s time to have your hardwood floors refinished.
Scratches Galore
Having a large number of scratches on your hardwood flooring is a clear and somewhat obvious sign that your floors need good refinishing, especially if any of those scratches have made it through the stain on your wooden flooring. While some scratching is normal, and they typically aren’t something you should see as out of the ordinary, having a floor that is covered in scratches, especially when they are in areas that are difficult to cover up with a rug or the like, it might be time to look into refinishing. Most scratching on your hardwood floors will be topical and will come out with a little bit of sanding, but for larger gouges and the like, you might wind up having to replace entire boards.
Gray Boards
If you notice that any of your floorboards are turning gray, and that wasn’t their color, to begin with, it is most definitely time to have them refinished before they start suffering from any more damage. When your hardwood flooring is turning gray, it is a clear sign that the polyurethane is wearing off, and when this happens, it means that your floors might be absorbing water. Whether from rain, snow, spilled drinks, or even just water that you or your pets track in, this moisture will continue to seep into your home’s floors until the wood turns black, at which point your only option is going to be a total replacement of your flooring.
Black Boards
As we stated above, blackboards are a bad sign when it comes to your hardwood flooring, especially if your boards weren’t stained that color, to begin with. If you have boards on your hardwood flooring that have already turned black, it’s too late for those particular parts. At this point, your best option is to bite the bullet and replace the boards that are affected before they can cause damage to the rest of your floor.
Water Damage
If your hardwood flooring has sustained water damage, you might see a separation between your floorboards, or some of them might start cupping. If your boards are cupping just a bit, this can usually be taken care of with a little bit of dedicated sanding, but if your boards have major separation, you’re likely to have them replaced.
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