7 Tips to Care for Your Hardwood Floors

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If you’re looking to remodel, home flooring is a great place to start.  I personally recommend hardwood floor or engineered wood flooring.  Hardwood floors are a great investment, as they add so much aesthetic and monetary value to your home.  They also go great with any decor style or motif, and hardwood never goes out of style!  Hardwood flooring is also very sturdy and can last a very long time, especially if you take care of it.  Today I’ll be sharing a few tips on how to care for your hardwood flooring.

Regular sweep or vacuum your floors –  A lot of hair and dust will collect on your wood floor.  (But it’s easier to see and clean up than it is with carpet.)  If you have a hardwood floors, a dust mop or soft bristled broom is essential for cleaning your floors.  And it’s also good to have a light weight vacuum cleaner that works well on hardwood and bare floors.  Just avoid using any tools or appliances that can scratch your floors.

Use Proper Cleaning Products – Water and a lot of chemical cleaners can discolor and ruin your hardwood floors.  You should find sprays and waxes that are completely safe and made for use on wood flooring.  Then read and carefully follow the product directions.  And anytime you try a new hardwood cleaner, you need to find a small, indiscriminate spot to use as a test area.

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Be careful with rugs – After you have a nice living room or dining room that’s covered with hardwood, it’s very tempting to put down an area rug and runners, but you should try to rearrange your rugs (and perhaps your furniture) from time to time.  My mom recently bought a house, and the hardwood had faded over time, except for areas where rugs had been laid down for years.  When the previous homeowners moved out, they took their rugs with them, and it was amazing how much darker the floor was in the places where the rugs had been laid out.  So you should definitely consider this, if you’re putting rugs down in a room that has hardwood.

Use window coverings – If you do love rugs, an alternative to rearranging your rugs or choosing not to have them at all, is using protective window coverings.  Our home has black out curtains, and these do a great job of blocking out that sunlight, which can fade out your hardwoods and home furnishings.

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Furniture Movers – I always love it when we get the chance to buy new furniture.  The only problem is, you have to move the old stuff out, and then you have to bring the new stuff in.  Apart from deciding where the furniture will go and getting it placed just right, my biggest concern is making sure our floors do not get ruined in the moving process.  For this, we always use furniture movers.  These can be placed under just about any furniture, from dressers and desks, to couches and beds.  And they make it easy for you to push furniture across a room without worrying about scratching your floors.  If you’re in a pinch and are working with furniture that isn’t quite as heavy, you could also use a towel or moving blanket.

Be careful with toys – If you have small children that play in the floor, you should inspect their toys to make sure that none of them could damage your floors.  If they have toys cars or anything made of metal that could potentially scratch your floors, you should for mat or rug that you can put down for play time.

Keep your pet’s nails groomed.  If you have cats, you should have a scratch post or pad. These are necessary for cleaning the outer shell off your cat’s nails.  And if you have a dog, you should consider regular nail trimmings.  (For the best in pet safety, I recommend going to a professional groomer or vet for this.)

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Once you know how to care for your hardwood floors, you will be able to protect your investment and ensure that your hardwood floors look great for years to come!

If you’re interested in hardwood floors or purchasing vinyl or tile with a hardwood look, you can find great deals online at GoHaus.  Go over and take a look!

 

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