Flooring for 2 recently purchased properties

[Roy Gutierrez]

Need to make a few decisions and I still don't have my big boy pants to make them! Bought 2 houses in the city of Oak Park here in Michigan, not a high end area but definitely a nice quiet/affordable city with very good neighbors watching for one another (at least in the better part, don't know to much about the less desirable part).

House 1:

House renting in the better area of the city, closer to high end areas, just got agreement to rent for $1,700/month (on condition of putting new cabinets and granite counters in the kitchen). First floor is all hardwoods, second floor has 2 HUGE bedrooms (prospective renters love them!), I tore out the stained carpets but now I need to decide what type of flooring to put in there considering that I'm getting decent rent AND 90% of the prospective renters have pets!

What type of flooring would you recommend for the second floor bedrooms?

House 2:

House renting in the less desirable part of the city but still decent area, I got advice here to use trafficmaster allure (which I did buy, a little concerned about having a crawlspace and maybe that affecting the flooring), the house totally redone almost all new, the living room and kitchen have an open floor plan, and I really want to keep the same flooring for both so it looks and flows with the open floor plan BUT my friend which used to be a contractor is trying to convince me to go with tile in the kitchen, I like tile in a kitchen just feel this will break up the openess that the place has but maybe I'm thinking to much with my heart and not with my head, maybe tile is better under the circumstances.

Last questions, if any michigan people know of an affordable, quality floor installer let me know.

Thank you!

[Lori Bossemeyer]

Don't know if this helps, but we also had a nicer rental (middle of Kansas), and used a laminate floor to replace carpet in the family room. Having installed laminate floor several times, I would say I definitely like it. In one rental, we installed laminate we purchased from our Sam's store--maybe a Costco in your area. We found flooring which looked like hand scraped hardwoods--12 mm with an attached backing. This is a tongue/groove install--but did add a little flooring glue as well. Price point was right around $1.40 sqft. In another rental we used allure. It is a little "cottage" we had just acquired--the carpet was disgusting! When I pulled it up, I started to get excited with the hardwoods underneath, but found that there were areas which had been "patched" with plywood, so could not really just refinish the floors. The other issue was the fact that the floor was not exactly level. The allure worked GREAT in this property. Could not have used the laminate, without using some leveler on the flooring and time was running out. The allure was a very simple install.

My opinion, being a pet owner, is that carpeting should go. Even if the pets do not have accidents, carpeting hold the pet hair and odors. Hopefully, you are also charging an additional deposit for pets. There are so few landlords that allow pets in my area, that it is not even questioned when I will allow A small pet. One thing I am also checking into, is the affect of pets on your property insurance. Depending on the breed, you may want to double check on the liability coverage. I am moving to requiring all renters have a renter's policy (had lots of argument with my partner over this issue--he thought I was being ridiculous--whole new topic--Partners.)

Hope this helps!