Buying A Home
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Wood vs Carpet stairs

We are under contract on our condo (woohoo!) and provided everything goes through with the buyers financing we should close May 8th which means we will get to buy the new build we have reserved! We are starting to work on picking our upgrades and are trying to decided what to do regarding stairs. I was initially leaning towards carpet because I have a 10 month old DD and I am worried about hardwood stairs being slippery and dangerous (for me and her when she's a bit older). However we also have cats and one in particular destroys all carpet/rugs we've ever had. Plus he's getting old and throws up a lot and I'm worried about stains. A few people have told me that hardwood really isn't that slippery (I've only ever had carpeted stairs but my sister had laminate and they were VERY slippery). Anyone with experience have any suggestions on which way to go? I like the look of hardwood much better and don't want to deal with replacing carpet in a couple years but I also don't want a huge safety hazard. If we do hardwood on the stairs we will have hardwood through the entire townhome (1900+ sq/ft). Will that be overkill on the hardwood? If we do carpet everything would be would be wood except for the stairs and the hall leading to the bedrooms.
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Re: Wood vs Carpet stairs

  • My only piece of advice here is that I always, ALWAYS fall up the carpeted stairs at my parent's house. So I don't necessarily know that one is more of a hazard than the other. You could always put those baby fences on the top and bottom of the stairs?

  • I much prefer hardwoods over carpet so I vote hardwoods.  When we moved into our house I ripped out all the carpet except in the bedrooms, and would have done those too if DH had let me.  We put in new stair treads to match the rest of the house, and also put hardwood in the hallway and I'm so glad we did.  We don't have kids, but we don't have any trouble with it being slippery.
  • I think carpeted stairs are slipperier than hardwood, unless you're prone to wearing nylon socks and running down the stairs while drunk/medicated/etc.  I fell down the carpeted stairs at our last house at LEAST once a month (thank GOD they were short flights) and although I spent 20+ years in a house/apartments with hardwood stairs, I only fell down those once.  Although that one time was a doozy (see explanation below, if you care).  So, I vote hardwood.

     

    Fall explanation: I got a 2nd degree sunburn and pretty severe dehydration, together with sun poisoning at an afternoon baseball game.  Went up the stairs for bed and into the bathroom, blacked out, must have tried to walk back down the stairs (in my slippery socks) and wound up waking up/becoming fully conscious about 6 stairs down - halfway through the fall.  That particular fall SUCKED, although I didn't break anything, probably due to being mostly unconscious.  I was bruised and sore (and also dehydrated, sick, and burned/blistered all over) for several days.  Bright side?  I didn't have to go to work like that.  Stick out tongue

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  • Go with wood stairs.

    You can teach little ones how to navigate stairs safely even before than are able to walk down them.  Our kids never fell on the stairs.

  • We're doing a new build, and both the builders rep AND our realtor strongly recommended against wooden stairs. The realtors from their own experience found them too noisy with children and pets running up and down them. Our builder does follow up surveys with their buyers and got negative feedback about the wooden stairs being noisy and slippery. That was good enough for us to decide to go with carpet. I like the look of hardwood too. Carpet might look strange if everything else is wood. My builder offers a wood option with a strip of decorative fabric/carpet down the middle. Maybe you could do something like that to mitigate the noise and slipperiness of wood. As a side note, I've always had carpeted stairs and never found them slippery.
  • imageriiskybusiness:

    My only piece of advice here is that I always, ALWAYS fall up the carpeted stairs at my parent's house. So I don't necessarily know that one is more of a hazard than the other. You could always put those baby fences on the top and bottom of the stairs?

    I always fell down, and up for that matter, my parents carpeted stairs growing up. I was very concerned about the stairs being slippery with hardwood or laminate but we are put laminate on our stairs. We found stuff that is textured and it seems to work just fine. I have not fallen on them yet!

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  • I fall down all stairs, whether carpet or hardwood, so there's that. I prefer to stumble down carpet. Softer landing.

    I'll stumble down carpet stairs and just twist an ankle. I slid the whole way down wood stairs and ended up spraining every muscle in my back. Ouch.

    Its really whatever you prefer. My house is all wood and ceramic tile, but we have carpeted stairs. It looks fine. They were wood when we moved in, but it was really loud.

     

    *Oh, and I have weak ankles.  I don't actually "fall down"the stairs. I stumble a little and slide down one or two on the edge. Just wanted to clarify.

  • We have carpeted stairs in our primary home and have had no issues. We have wood stairs in our summer home and I have slipped down those a couple of times. Now the only way I go down them is bare foot so I know I will not slip. 
  • We have hardwood with a textured (sort of a diamond pattern - its low pile) pattern.  I love the combination. DS has never had an issue. And it helps for them not to look so dirty all the time since we also have here dogs.
  • Hardwoods just because you just need to sweep them, not drag a vacume cleaner to clean then.
  • Congrats on the contract!

    I would go with hardwood, hands down. Carpet on the stairs gets worn down quickly. If it ends up being an issue you could always put one of those rugs on the stairs that can easily be changed out. Hardwood throughout is my dream.

  • Do hardwoods and put a runner on them, easier to clean, less slippery.
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  • I don't know which has a higher accident rate but from my experience from falling down both, falling on carpeted stairs hurts less. But I would just go with whatever your personal preference is and teach your kids to be careful on the stairs.
  • We have cats and allergies, so we always do hardwood floors. All over and its not too much. You can always get area rugs.
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  • I would go hardwood, but I'm strongly anti-carpet anywhere. I just think carpet is a nasty dust and mold trap and my daughter's pulmonologist has told us that we're never to live somewhere with carpeting because of her (and my) asthma. We have nothing covering our hardwood floors that isn't thrown in the washing machine weekly because even little rag throw rugs get nasty if they go over a week without a thorough washing.
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