When undertaking a basement renovation, you’ve probably wondered just what basement flooring ideas you might have available. If I’m not the first to tell you let me at least be one of them, basement flooring is risky business. Most factory warranties you’ll read about lead to a fear of imminent destruction by water moisture or flooding. Well here’s a news flash for you. Most things that water touches via flooding it destroys and if you take care of your moisture issues in your basement your options should be fairly wide open.
Now that being said, some basements will be more suited to different types of basement flooring options than others. When considering different basement flooring ideas you should question the durability of the material. Go high with this estimate but for the most part, basements tend to see medium use as a general rule of thumb as they do not typically encounter heavy traffic loads.
Instead of putting a new addition on your home, finish your basement. Most of the hard part is already done, it’s built. That doesn’t cost you anything but putting on that new room extension to your current home certainly would and then you would have to finish it. This will give your family room to grow that won’t bear that additional building expense as well as finishing expense. Here’s another news flash for you, finished basements are among the top 3 choices that buyers look for when purchasing a home. You can instantly add value to your home just by finishing your basement if you are looking to sell it. Who know’s, it might sell quicker or add an extra 10 g’s to the sale price for a minimal investment.
There are many different materials you could choose from during your brainstorm for basement flooring ideas so keep your options open. Here’s a pretty basic list to get you started with.
Basic Basement Flooring Ideas:
- Laminate Flooring
- Vinyl Flooring
- Carpet
Best Basement Flooring Ideas:
- Refinished Concrete
- Porcelain Tile
- Marble Tile
- Ceramic Tile
Some of the best basement flooring ideas have been around for quite sometime and still hold true for basement flooring. I’m a really big fan on refinishing concrete as a basement flooring idea. A nice stain and buff job and you have a flooring option that bears no rivals in my opinion. The only thing you’ll have to account for is how cold the floor may become, but there are options for that as well. If you’re worried about the coldness of a stained concrete floor in the basement, you could go with some ceramic tile basement flooring with some inlaid radiant heat to warm the floor up.
{ 5 comments… read them below or add one }
interesting info – trying to decide which flooring option for our basement – 1.5 yrs old house – like concrete stain idea but concerned about cold floors, acid vs water based stain, need a rug too for teenage hangout… have dogs down there often, like cork but too pricey, concrete stain pricey too, vinyl cheapest…no moisture problems seen yet…one room is for exercise …like rubber foor but also very expensive…still trying to decide
We have a basement that floods every three to five years after many days of hard rain. We get 6 to 8 inches of water when this happens. I have heard of a flooring where an epoxy or some kind is painted on the floor and then chips are spread over it and then sealed. Is this a good option for our type of basement situation? If not, what can you recommend. Our laudry room and workshops are in the basement so we would like to continue to use the space.
Thanks
Hi Kathy – if you’ve got a basement that floods every 3-5 years I would definitely stick to a concrete solution if you can divert those flood waters. One of the things you can look into is some basement floor paint or garage floor epoxy. I’d suggest the epoxy over just paint and make sure that there is some anti-slip flecks included. You can get some pretty nifty prepackaged kits available for this just about all over the place. You just need to know how big (square footage) your basement is and order the appropriate kit. Some of them even come included with everything so you don’t even need to go to the hardware store and pick up the paint brushes and other necessities.
What can I expect for cost of acid stained concrete compared to other options. For comparisons sake, how would a standard non-fancy finished concrete compare with the popular quality of carpets and vinyls?
Thanks,
RK
Hi Raj – there’s a lot of variables left out of the equation here for acid stained concrete so I’ll just give you a quick comparison on what you could expect. For a company or contractor to come in and do a simple concrete stain on your basement floor, you are likely looking at anywhere from $3 to $5 a square foot dependent on the quality chosen. You can however buy the stain yourself and do it and those range anywhere from $40 per gallon of stain to complete kits that cost anywhere from $100 to $250 per kit. You’d need to know your square footage and what you want to put down to get an exact figure.