Wood floors and resale: Painting vs sanding/refinishing
Have been working on renovating an older (1940s) house for very long time to sell, about a year. Only the floors are left, and money and time is getting pretty tight. Very much need to be done and have this up for sale by end of month.
The kitchen floor is finished, but there are three other rooms left downstairs (dining room, front room, and side room) and a bedroom upstairs that still need completed. All is done, but the floors.
I pulled up the old carpet and it was in pretty bad shape, but there are wood floors underneath. They're sound- not exceptional, kind of shabby but real wood floors. Recarpeting all this will cost a lot, so I'm looking at another option.
My question is, what about painting the wood floors? I'm wondering about doing this, maybe a high gloss grey or brown instead of all the additional time work and money of renting lugging in a drum sander and refinishing. Its there that much more home resale value, in sanded/stained wood floors, as opposed to freshly painted. As far as it being an older house, I know painting floors was common back in the day. It also would be easier since there are gouges and irregularities in the wood floor. These could be filled and get a smoother floor appearance.
Resale value: Painted vs stained wood floors? How big a difference?