As a pet owner, you must personalize your home to suit the needs of your dog. Obviously, allowing your canine, big or small, to stay inside the house will affect your lifestyle. Some lifestyle choices affect how your home interior is set and the kind of food that you consume. A dog eats pees, poops, backs, scratches, bites and jumps up and down. It sheds fur also. Therefore, you will always spend extra time cleaning your interior compared to those that keep dogs out of their living space. That is, no matter how well trained your dog is. However, you understand well just how friendly dogs are, and it is always great to have them for support, security, and companionship. In that case, you should carefully consider your flooring options. Some floor configurations are just ideal for people who have dogs, desire to save money, and would rather avoid spending all their time cleaning after the pets.
All Dogs Are Different; Can We Say the Same about Floors?
Some dogs jump up and down so much that they could slip and fall. Some floors are smooth and slippery, while others offer enough traction to prevent slips. Some dogs pee in the house, and they ruin wood floors and carpets. Some floors require carpets to keep homes warm, and some floors do not absorb liquids. Some dogs bite and scratch at floors while some are quite gentle. Some floors are easy to scratch, while some are tough and scratch-resistant. When you want to select a suitable floor type for your house dog, you must consider its weight, training, and temperament. You can also consider the access that it has to different rooms within the house. Floor installation is charged by square meters, and different floor types vary in per square meter pricing. Therefore, you can install particular floor types in rooms that your dog can access and save money by installing different floor types in the other rooms.
Most folks who keep dogs tend to have a taste for hardwood floors. They are financially stable people who have some exquisite taste. However, should they have young dogs living with them, they may be plagued with the need to repair the floors more frequently than they’d like. Dogs may also pee on such elegant floors and soil them in the long run. Fortunately, you can keep such floors in select rooms and protect them with carpets. The following are some considerations that you should make when deciding how to go about flooring your house for your pets.
Scratch Resistance
Some of the scratch-resistant floors are made with materials such as tiles, vinyl, laminate, and solid hardwood. Vinyl and solid hardwood vary in their quality and scratch-resistant nature while laminate offers the most excellent scratch-resistant performance.
Water Resistance
If your dog is jumpy and may knock water-containing vessels often, a water-resistant floor could be an excellent choice. The same applies to dogs that pee and drool all over. Tile and vinyl floors offer top-notch water resistance. Engineered hardwood floors vary in their water-resistance performance. Laminate and solid hardwood floors are suitable for water resistance, but they absorb and disintegrate in the long run.
Traction
Traction is another important factor to consider when deciding flooring options for rooms. Is your dog aging? If it is, you do not want it to access slippery floors and break its fragile bones. Engineered and solid hardwood floors are dangerous for jumpy dogs, and you may need to cover them with carpets to increase traction. Vinyl and laminate offer moderately safe traction, but you must always keep them dry to avoid slippery situations. Tile floors are simply excellent for all types of dogs.
How about Easy Cleaning?
Tile floors may be expensive to install, but they are extra easy to clean. Vinyl is also extremely easy to clean. Unlike tiles that stain when liquids sit, vinyl floors are stain-resistant. They exist in different ranges of color, and some are even sold as luxury items. Laminate floors vary in thickness. Thicker laminate floors comprise of a fused top layer on top of the fiberboard. They require immediate cleaning when not installed in the right way.
When we install engineered and solid hardwood for you, we try to seal it for increased traction and water resistance. We especially pay attention to the areas where your dog has access.
