jojo

I love HW - and certainly think you could get it w/in the budgeted price range. However, if properly installed, stain, poly - the water will NOT be the issue but the chlorine will. My friend has a pool, and tracks from the wet/chlorine feet.

That said - there are some "ifs" in there

IF
- the children don't come in w/wet feet -

More importantly
- IF you have a new coat of poly put on your flooring every 1-2 yrs in the high traffic rooms - this is where most people fail, and end up needing entire refinishing. New coat of poly is the flooring people just scratch the top surface & apply new poly - no mess

Best to you

check out Konecto - It is a watertight, vinyl product that really looks pretty close to wood - especially the prestige line. You could probably DIY and it is a floating floor so if you want to replace later, you are not peeling off old glue. We are looking at it for a back door area. They say you can use in bathroom, basement...looks great to me anyhow. ;)

I'll check that out, kj. I've never heard of it, but I think we are probably looking for either porcelain or wood to use in this home because it is so formal. :-/

jejvtr, I'm afraid the kids probably WILL come in with wet feet. But maybe I could do a tile landing right inside the house???

I had the same concern with our renovation and I decided to get what I love. I have two very young kids and a pool. I ended up putting hardwood in my kitchen and family room, which has doors to the pool. I put tile (porcelain that looks like limestone) in our multipurpose back room (mudroom, laundry room, powder room & other pool entrance). It was a hard decision, but I love the look of the hardwood and the price was great (less than $5 sq.ft). I plan to lock the family room doors to the pool and make the kids towel off in the back room. Hope it works.

Someone on another forum said 'design for the life you have, not the life you wish you had'. I have wood floors, I love wood floors; I do not have a pool and will never have a pool. The whole landing idea seems pointless to me. If you could 'train' the kids to stand on the landing and dry off, why not dry off outside? If you suspect they'll rush into the house and hit the fridge without thinking (like I would have done at that age) accept reality and go with porcelain. My mother has porcelain floors that visitors always say, "I love your travertine". Some of the porcelains are very good replicas. I have personally not seen any good wood-look tile. It might exist, the stuff I've seen is not good. You might price out the cost of having poly applied every few years because, in my old region, that was $3.00 a sq. ft. I don't like to be a slave to my house and possessions, and I don't want to be grouchy with my family for not being more careful. So I tend to opt for easier maintenance. For me, wood is ideal, I'm not sure it is for you.

Can you put a sealer on the travertine to make it more durable? I am sure there is a porcelain that would look good, but be sure to get one that is not too smooth, slippery when wet. I would be worried about the wood myself even with all the sealers they have nowadays. I like the look of wood in kitchens, but I would be worried about water getting in between the "cracks" and get swollen up wood.

We have the vinyl Konecto flooring inside our door area, it has a very nice surface texture,warm color.-love it. But I don't know how it would stand up to wet traffic if children/others coming out of a swimming pool.

We have ceramic tile where we come in from the pool, but to get through to the baths, you have to go across wood flooring.

DH loves our wood floors and freaks anytime a drop is spilled on them. So, needless to say, when someone comes in from the pool, I am always checking after them to see if they just went to the fridge, or all the way back to the baths. There I am wiping up wet footprints and hoping they don't feel bad that they 'ran through'.

In hindsight, I would make sure I had some hard flooring (not wood) all the way to a bathroom (and the fridge) from the pool, and not have to worry about the wood getting wet.

You want to enjoy your company and your pool, not worry about your flooring every time.