Here’s a quick question for anyone who knows about stairs and their approximate costs to finish!
My husband and I need to decide how we will finish our stairs in our house we doing a major renovation on. It will be a straight staircase against one wall but open to the room (with a railing) on one side. (not your typical dramatic foyer staircase, just a standard one at the edge of a room See my attached pictures for the floor plan and a rough sketch of the side view of the stairs. (The first one’s rough, I know, but I just drew it up quick (and obviously it’s not to scale).
The floor of the room will be hardwood (not pre-finished). The upstairs hallway (where the stairs lead) will be carpet.
We do not want to do plain hardwood stairs because they will be slippery. We’d really like to do hardwood stairs with a carpet runner up the middle. If we did that, how would we deal with the landing? Would the runner turn and also come down the last step our into the room? Or would it just continue straight and end at the wall?
Also, how costly is this compared to just carpeting the whole stairs with a decent grade carpet? I guess we’re just trying to figure out if it would be worth it? If it’s a huge price difference we might just do carpet because we need to watch our budget. But we’d really like to do the hardwood with runner if it’s really not going to be that much difference in cost.
One other thing to note, we intend to install (but not finish) the hardwood floors ourselves. We are nervous about installing hardwood on the stairs though. Is that much more difficult than installing hardwood on a floor? I would imagine it would be so the cost might include having someone else come out just to install the stairs?
If we decided to do carpet on the stairs for now, how hard would it be to do it later (10 years from now)? I only ask because our framer has said he needs to know what we want before he builds the stairs. Is that because he will build them differently based on whether or not we want carpet or hardwood? So if we go with carpet now, could we ever do hardwood later without ripping out something on the stairs?
Any insight would be appreciated!!
Thanks,
-Kacy
Replies
Dont go cheap on the stairs!
Think of them more as a large piece of built in furniture. Even your stairs running up the side of a room will make a big impact well done, if not well done- a eyesore (and earsore if it squeks)
By no means a stairbuilder, I have done some. Your contractor needs to know because of the code for height of treads. And how to cut the stringers: different for 3/4 hardwood, 2x wood with carpet, etc. etc. The varition of height in between treads changes when you plop down carpet and padding on treads not mathed out for carpet.
I used milled hardwood on stairs (only three times- no expert), not the strips of hardwood flooring.
I find putting finish on stairs easier than floors (able to hand sand/ not much square footage.)
Not all hardwood stairs are slippery.
I have seen cataloge hardware for holding down a runner on stairs.
hope this helps,
steve
http://www.lukeworks.com
I agree with mrsteve. Don't cheap out on this item. Stairs are a permanent fixture in the home, whether furnished or not.
Carpet over the whole staitway is quite a bit cheaper than wood treads, but again, the method of construction is different (materials, tread heights). It's difficult to switch out carpet for hardwood at a later date. It may also complicate your railing layout (I don't know if your starting your balusters at tread or on a cap wall). I would opt for the hardwood now, if you are at all planning on it someday.
Your runner could stop at the landing easily. Or you could seam it at the turn and finish the descent to ground floor. Or start at ground floor, rise to the landing, and stop. Then start at the first riser of the main run and continue to the top.
Here are some ballbark figures to use, since I'm dealing with this right now on a 9 year old house (built with carpet-grade stairs and covered with really cheap carpet).
Option one - redo stairs in oak .... $5000 (that's total cost - material, installation, finish)
Option two - new carpet (good grade from Home Depot) ... $500 installed
So even though we just had hardwood put in the downstairs (kitchen) and upstairs hall, we opted to 'live with' carpeted stairs. Frankly, if I had known it would be only $500, I would have re-carpeted these years ago.
I had hardwood stairs in my first house, with a runner, and hardwood stairs in my second house, without a runner. No problems with either. I think they turn the corner one landings by mitering the carpet, although I never had that situation.
Last point - I am a very competent DIYer but would not do stairs myself. In fact, watching the guys install the hw in the kitchen and hall was humbling - something I will always leave to the pros in the future. It would have taken me months, and the result would not have been as good. FYI, I paid $8 per sq ft for everything (material, installation, finish) and they used nice 3 1/4" red oak.
I can't say about costs. But, I did stairs with solid oak treads and painted risers and stringers. The look came out great. The treads were not slippery, even in stocking feet. Don't use furniture polish on them!
You don't install hardwood over treads. If you want wood, you make the treads out of wood.
The decision of carpet vs. bare has to be made before the stairs are constructed because the height of each step has to be calculated exactly, and the thickness of the carpet and treads matter. Code, and safety, require all the riser heights be equal to each other within about 1/4 to 3/8". You have to know what will be on the treads, and what the flooring will be on the upper and lower floors to get it to all come out right.
If you choose carpet, consider a thin commercial carpet or a Berber. They wear well and are easier to vacuum.
to save $ and still have a nice look... you can get premade treads with a hardwood end... (they are usually 1 1/4 MDF treads with hardwood ends) you carpet up the stairs but the hardwood shows on the last 6" or so... doing this i'd use hardwood on the landing with a bullnose edge... for the 16 to 20sf on the landing money well spent...use a 3/4 plywood subfloor and even if you use a prefinished wood floor on top of that you'd still look good... do web search for stair treads you'll find em... i know u can buy em online... finish'n the small ends is an easy DYI project with these use a simple 1x painted riser...
pony