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Hardwood stairs vs carpeted stairs.
Both carpet and wood stairs cost a lot of money to purchase and lay on the stairs.
Updated mar 11 2020.
Some treads might help with the safety aspect.
Some possible reasons for the carpeting on stairs and upper hallway landings.
Beautiful hardwood stairs will be ruined by the addition of carpeting because the tack strips need to be nailed down creating holes in the wood.
Carpet also won t last as long as hardwood and will need to be replaced frequently.
Hardwood is however generally more expensive than carpets but it is also easier to maintain and it lasts longer than a carpet.
Besides most homeowners with nice wooden stairs wouldn t be considering carpeting in the first place would they.
In addition should a fall ever occur carpet offers a much softer landing spot than wood flooring which could help reduce the likelihood of injury.
On the other hand all hardwood stairs need is a good sweeping and mopping maybe even a swipe with a damp towel.
I m even more of a detractor now that it has caused.
I hate vacuuming carpeted stairs and am so glad to be in my first one story house.
Hard surfaces are slippery and can easily lead to a fall.
Cost and noise reduction come immediately to mind.
You ll have to get out the vacuum and give carpeted stairs a good deep cleaning about once a week.
Carpeted stairs will obviously accumulate more dust and dirt than hardwood.
Having carpet on the stairs doesn t necessarily prevent falls but it helps to provide traction compared to hardwood.
But cold weather hit before we got around to sanding and staining the handrails so they sat in the garage until the weather warmed up.
Slipping sliding safety.
I can t speak to the noise issue as i can t say i ever noticed hardwood or carpeted stairs being more or less noisy.
Carpet works wonders on stairs like this.
To tell you the truth we had most of the transformation from carpeted stairs to hardwood completed last fall.
Our previous hardwood stairs had treads and with four kids and a dog we didn t have any incidents.
I ve seen this done in many model homes in chicago too.
Hardwood also doesn t collect allergens like carpet.
Carpeting is usually less expensive than hardwood.