re-doing wood floors

[Smart Red]

I had an empty apartment that needed work. Wednesday we went in and cleaned the wood floors, scraping paint drips, gum, candle wax, small paper stars, etc, anything that could have gotten on or into wood flooring in the past 60 years. Then we washed everything as clean as possible and the floors to dry.

While I didn't have 'before' photos, I did take pictures today.
Someone didn't sweep the closets so when I got to them, I had to leave them until later. That was the color of much of the floor, especially around the edges. The centers were bare wood and dirt in most places. I stained the whole floor to even out the colors.

Here is the stained floor.


Here, with and without shine.
Here, with and without shine.

Here is the same floor with its coating of polyurethane.

We stopped by tonight to check for drying. Here is the final result. I think it makes the apartment look so much better. Friday we will put down another coat of polyurethane and Saturday we will have a marathon painting session (the whole place) so everything will look just right for the new tenants.

This is NOT the recommended way to re-finish wood flooring. All the "character"of the gouges, scratches, and divots is still there, but the end result is so pleasing for rental property. This is the third apartment I've performed this process on. I would probably not do a floor this way for my own home, but I do like the results.

 

[Daniel martin]

!WOW! looks great in the pic's if its just a rental then what you did is great most owners would of left it like it was GREAT JOB

 

[Smart Red]

Thank you, Daniel. I like to think my tenants appreciate a nice place to live just as I would. Once they move in, it's hard to do anything like that.

 

[RalphXhoff]

It really looks amazing.... I have a carpeted floor and I find it tedious maintaining it. My pets add to my work and I vacuum clean the floor thrice a week. Your pics are really impressive and I feel this flooring would suit my home better. Thank you for posting the thread. Very useful.

 

[Kristi Ambrose]

I love wood floors, but man, over time they really do get ucky. Thankfully you put a little love into fixing them up! I just bought 2 new homes, one in my home city Pittsburgh and one in my second city Florida. Of course Floridians always seem to have tile in their kitchens. But, I ripped it out for a few reasons, one of the main reasons was because I wanted something that wasn't so damn hard! Also, I tend to cook a lot and tiles kill my feet and knees lol. I love the look of wood. We ordered large planked wood floors from a place called Oak and Broad. We ordered custom black walnut with a Monocoat Pure finish. They. Look. Awesome! Wood is definitely a good investment.

 

[Smart Red]

We had all carpeting in here when we first built some 40 years ago, but I've been replacing it with oak flooring room by room as they are redone. Hopefully, soon all but the living and dining rooms will be oak. I find it much easier to keep up although the grands prefer carpeting.

I really love my steam mop for keeping the gunk from getting a foothold starting on the floors.