Just because you have a tight budget, it doesn't mean you should have to compromise on getting the perfect floor. Read on for our top tips on choosing a floor which offers durability and style whilst staying within your budget.
Choose the Right Materials
One of the first decisions you'll make when choosing a floor is the type of material it's made from. Each flooring material covers a huge price range, from the affordable to the luxury, but some materials are generally more affordable than others. For example, if your heart is set on a real wood floor you may have only considered solid wood flooring, however, you might find you prefer engineered flooring instead. Engineered floors have a solid wood surface but a strong, supportive plywood or HDF base layer. This means that they look and feel the same as a solid wood floor, but they're considerably more affordable.
If you're looking for something that's a little more hardwearing, you might want to consider a laminate floor. These are made from a High Density Fibreboard and covered in a hyper-realistic photo of the material of your choice, including wood, stone and ceramics. We offer laminate floors from just £8 a metre, making them one of the cheapest possible flooring options.
Consider smaller brands
There are a few big names in flooring which have rightly earnt their place at the top of the pile - Kahrs, Quickstep and Karndean to name just a few. Whilst these brands are certainly industry leaders, it doesn't mean that they're your only choice. Sometimes, smaller brands can give you just the same style and quality as the big names. For example, our own flooring brand, Natura, was made to bring the highest quality real wood floors to a wider audience by creating them to the highest standards whilst still keeping the costs low. There are plenty of other brands which are producing incredible floors, so be sure to check out the list of all of our brands here.
Buy from one place
There can be a lot to consider when buying a new floor - it's why we put so much effort into an easy to understand Advice Centre. Once you've chosen the floor you might also need adhesive, underlay, scotia, skirting or any number of accessories to go with it. Our biggest tip for this is to try to get as much as possible from one place; having a single delivery cost makes the project much cheaper over all. It also makes it much easier to make sure that all your accessories match up, which is important if you want your floor to look it's best. That's why we're so pleased that we're able to be a one-stop shop for all your flooring needs. If you're not quite sure what you need, just give us a quick call and our fantastic team of experts will help you out.
Install it yourself
We can all splash a bit of paint around, or wrestle with wallpaper, but many of us would consider fitting a new floor to be a job for the professionals. Getting in a professional is well worth the cost if you're not comfortable doing the work yourself. However, you might be please to know that many modern floors are designed specifically to be DIY jobs.
Engineered and laminate floors, for example, are known as ‘floating floors’, which are perfectly suitable for DIY projects. We have quick guides, as well as flooring-specific guides, in our Advice Centre.
Luxury Vinyl Tiles have always been a difficult floor for an amateur to install, as each tile needs gluing down, so we usually recommend calling in a professional. However, several ranges have been launched which use the same locking system found in floating floors, and so are recommended for anybody looking to cut out the installation costs.
Karndean Looselay is an LVT which is also probably the quickest and easiest of any floor to install. These thick tiles can - in the right conditions - be laid without any adhesive or underlay. Simply drop them down and you're done.
With these tips hopefully you can see a few ways in which you can save money without having to compromise on what you want. Thought of any more? Let us know in the box below.
