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Carpet is quoted/sold by the square yard most often. Some shops will have some carpets quoted by sq. yd., others by sq ft and all in the same showroom! Anything to make it more difficult to decipher I sometimes think. If I remember correctly, Smartstrand comes in a standard 12' width. How much you need vs how much waste there will be will be determined by which direction the carpet is put down and whether or not your carpet guy finds places to use what would otherwise be "waste". This can figure into the price greatly as some dealers will figure the amount of carpet needed without any regard to efficient use of the material. (i.e. for easy use of round numbers, lets say the carpet is $5 sqft & you have 2 closets that are 5'x7' that need carpeting--he can price you out 7' of 12' wide carpet that he will split between the 2 closets and have 2'x7' of waste for the most efficient use of the material @ cost of $420, or he could decide to quote you 7' of 12' wide carpet for each closet for the most inefficient use of carpet, but most efficient twisting of sales numbers @ cost of $840). We had ~1000 square feet of carpet and a local dealer that gave us contractor pricing and was really into using the material in the most efficient manner possible--what would have been waste from the bedrooms was used in the closets. It ran us right around $3500 including pad, installation and taxes. So that's right at $3.50 sqft. As far as Stainmaster goes, we had it in our last house. In most areas it was not a problem, however, we had 1 spot in DS1's room where the dog had an accident and in DS2's room where he threw his bottle out of the crib and formula leaked onto the carpet. In both rooms, the stains would appear to be gone after a pretreat and steam cleaning, but then a few days later they would reappear--never could get rid of them. Not saying SS wouldn't do the same, but that was my experience with SM. Also, here's an excerpt from an earlier post of mine on our carpet choice of SS vs other similar competitor carpets w/ SM-- "When we were looking, no other carpet compared--even the Shaw carpet that is supposed to be the direct competition for the Smartstrand. Nothing was as soft. I remembered what it was like as a kid playing on the stiff scratchy carpet and decided that since it was available, I wanted a soft carpet for my kids to play on and for my feet to walk on at the end of a long day in the hated high heels. Even DH was surprised by how soft it was--he thought carpet was carpet was carpet & as he said those exact words, he ran his hand across the Smartstrand sample and then said, "Ooooooh!?!". Then he understood. I still close my eyes in pure pleasure when I step into my bedroom and onto the carpet at the end of a long day." I've posted a link below to a thread off the Flooring forum on price comparisons. Check out the 1st response by Floortech... Hope this helps! Here is a link that might be useful: Smartstrand Pricing @ Lowe's

We had the Smartstrand Silk from HD installed throughout the whole house in August and I can highly recommend it. Just this morning my dog vomited and it came clean with just water. Just make sure your vacuum will work on it :-) We, too, had to "move". That's what it felt like anyway. We had the carpet installed in two parts, one week apart. Since we had closet systems, they all had to be dismantled and cleared out, the old carpet & pad removed and rooms painted (all by us) before the carpet was layed so it was a really rough couple of weeks. We just moved everything from one side of the house to the other and then back again, putting a lot of things in the basement (We still don't have everything back where it's supposed to be). We had considered renting a pod but decided that was just as much work and a lot more money. It was really, really hard although it gave us a chance to clean out all the junk we didn't even know we had! I told my DH we'll either move or be dead before I'd do that again :-)

I'd guess it's hard for people who know carpet, or are willing to help you search, to make suggestions without more info. Pictures of your home and especially the area surrounding the stairway would be helpful.