18 years old,that project was done with CCA mateial. Buy now and you will get acq material the life of said is no place near the cca stuff, in fact no one has any idea on what the life span of even .40 acq will be. I do know when I cut into acq the center is still yellow the preasure treatment looks like spray paint. CCA never did this. Composite material on the hype scale is hmmmmm around 10 points with #1 being no hype at all. Ipe is 0 hype or #1 on the hype scale. Will a high $ ipe deck last 20 years with a acq.40 frame under it ? Now that is a hype question. It has nothing to do with ipe, everything to do with the green mafia pushing big money into an area they knew nothing about. Then drifing on over to the wine/pasta bar after calling jane fonda on the cell in Carmel and asking how the grilled shirmp was. I have a Wallet over here with a 20 year old pt cca project fairly big one,same kinda thing splits,splenters, but hey!! the thing still stands and dont look all that bad in a realative sort of way. I did some replacement,very cool ipe benches with allum balusters, couple of coats of twp finish,braced up the tiled bar,things like that. Tina is good for another 20 with some upkeep and furture replacement of the decking but I cant see any problem with the frame. J

Generally, we do the final floor coat, then the baseboards -- for the reason you indicated, it keeps the floor finish off the baseboards. Otherwise, you have to mask the basboards, which is just more work.. If the floors were done right, you won't need a shoe -- unless, of course, you just like the look. Wood floors should get a sealer coat and two finish coats.

Looks like you have a really large porch off side, I actually like that you plan to connect it off those patio doors out of kitchen/dining area and give yourselves a small private balcony off master not connected to rest. Not sure what your weather is like but ours here does not justify a massive uncovered/unscreened/unenclosed deck (and to cover and screen all of it would be $$$$) and risks becoming more headache than pleasure, so I understand why you don’t want one. Plus the concerns about shading the future walk out basement. I don’t think you need to burn your house down :) I still vote Option 3 after seeing or understanding more of your overall short and long term plans.

Pictures of the area in question would help. But for best results and longevity of the deck, removing the pavers will be optimum. Of course this advice is obviously sight unseen.