In the 1960s and 1970s it was common to cover beautiful hardwood floors with carpeting. Now, some 40 plus years later people want to find out what is under that carpet and know if it can be restored. For a lucky few, the hardwood floor exposed is in great condition and needs very little work. More often it involves more work to restoring hardwood floors. To wood floor lovers there is no question to restore the wood as opposed to leave the carpeting or buy new carpeting. It was common practice when carpeting hardwood floors to use nails or staples which naturally increased the damage to the wood. This type of damage can be repaired but there are some instances where it is best just to replace the hardwood. One of these instances is if there are pet stains on the hardwood floor. More often than not that cannot be corrected so the wood must be replaced.

You may attempt to restore the hardwood floor yourself or you can hire a professional. Many people find the satisfaction of doing the job themselves well worth it although it does require quite a bit of work to accomplish. It is much more involved that refinishing a hardwood floor. You may find that a how-to video is all you need to do the job yourself, especially if you are a do-it-yourself person. If you decide to hire someone to do it be sure they have experience restoring hardwood floors and not just refinishing them. Get recommendations if possible from friends or co workers.

There have been many treasures discovered under carpets across the nation. Many of the older homes have hardwood floors under the carpets that have patterns in them that cannot be replicated. Of course, the older the home, the older the wood. To check your own carpet take a pliers and carefully lift a corner of the carpet. Remember that there will be dirt, old padding residue and other things that will probably be covering the wood. In some rare instances you can see how beautiful the end result will be once the floor is restored. More often it takes a little wiping and scratching on the surface of the wood to actually be able to see the wood grain.

More and more people are checking to see if the hardwood beneath their carpets can be restored. The results can be remarkable and most people are happy they did it. It doesn’t hurt to have a look and see if it would be worth the effort to restore your hardwood floors. Remember that under that linoleum in the kitchen there is probably a hardwood floor too. There is nothing like the beauty and charm of hardwood floors.

Interested in hardwood floors for your home? Get your project started by submitting a free BuyerZone request for hardwood floor price quotes.