Hardwood floor gives a classic and traditional look to your home. Hardwood flooring, with its natural look, makes your home beautiful. People are using hardwood flooring from centuries and many still prefer it.
But hardwood floors are prone to damage due to various reasons. However, with proper maintenance and care you can protect wooden flooring.
Here are the few tips to protect your hardwood floor and to keep it shiny.
Moisture damage
One of the main reasons for the wood damage is water spills on the wooden floor. Drying it up immediately can avoid the damage to the floor.
Another way to protect your wooden floor is by maintaining humidity in your home. Don’t install wooden floor near moist areas like bathroom.
Renew/Refinish your wooden floor
As we know, hardwood floor is made by natural wood. Due to humidity wood will expand and get spoiled. When you find this kind of changes in wooden floor, find the source where it started and renew it with sanding. You should be doing this process once in every couple of years.
If your floor is finished on site (at your place), it will have polyurethane finish. And if it is a prefinished floor, it is likely to have aluminum oxide finish. The aluminum oxide finish is more durable than polyurethane one. In any case, sanding and refinishing possible on wooden floor. Don’t use waxes and oil on wood as it can damage refinishing.
Extra effort on cleaning
Hardwood flooring is easy to clean. Still you need to put extra care to make it look beautiful. In order to clean your floors mop it regularly; don’t use wet mop, using wet mop dulls the wood. Instead use dry mop (micro fiber duster) or broom to sweep.
Experts suggest using natural products like olive oil to make your wood floors shinier. Apart from this, there are several products available in the market to take care of wood flooring. Check with a flooring specialist before using any of these products on your wooden floor.
Avoid scratches
To protect your wooden floor from scratches, place pads onto bottom of the chairs legs, tables and heavy furniture that could damage floor when moved. You can even use plastic floor glides to avoid scratches.
Avoid chairs with rollers; they will scratch up the floor with dirt. Use chair mats to avoid damage to the floor. Avoid wearing shoes and high heels on wooden floor.
If you have pets at your home you need to give extra attention to wood floor. Cut your pets’ nails regularly to keep them healthy and to avoid scratches on the wooden floor.
Keep entrance mats inside and outside of the entry door to avoid scratches.
Using rugs and carpets on the wood floor adds style to the floor and reduces scratches. Show extra care to these rugs or carpets – vacuum them regularly.
Follow the above said points to avoid damage to your hardwood flooring. Take help of local flooring contractor if you have a major problem with your wooden flooring.