If you are standing in the aisles of Lowe’s or Home Depot thinking that putting down peel and stick vinyl flooring is a good idea I suggest your step away from the “cheap choice” and break out the bucks for some real tile. Sure it’s gonna cost you more but when you change your mind in 5 years and want to take that peel and stick up you will thank me. I promise.
Peel and stick tile is the devil. I admit to having used it to tile the laundry room in a house we used to live in. The room was only 5x7 so it wasn’t like I was tiling the whole house, but still it was a bad idea. One I will never ever have again.
When we ripped the carpet out of the room that will eventually be our bedroom we found that the previous homeowner had been one of those who thought peel and stick was a good idea. Perhaps he was trying to make the floor more level to put carpet over or perhaps he was trying to cover up some of the gouges in the hardwood. Who knows there might even be a blood stain or some other heinous mess under there just waiting to be rediscovered. Regardless of his reasons I want to beat him. (not possible since he passed away shortly after he lost the house)
Peel and stick tile is like the glue that won’t stop holding. You can chip away at it for hours and still not make any headway. The glue smells horrible and sniffing too much makes you woozy. It comes apart in little pieces instead of large one and then when you do get it up you’ve got all this nasty residue behind. Sounds bad for a room at that’s 5x7 right? What about a room that’s 14x16. Yes that’s right folks…the room is huge and it’s going to take ages to get cleared of that mess.
Today we spent 3 hours chipping away at it and barely made headway. My hands hurt from the scraper and the tips of my fingers hurt from the multiple times I rammed them into jagged pieces of tile.
I keep reminding myself that under the tile is a beautiful floor but at this rate it’s gonna be next summer before we get to refinish it. I hate this room!
No comments:
Post a Comment