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hardwood floor installation: are these damages acceptable?

2 years ago

Hi, we are building a new construction house. We have spent months to pick the engineered hardwood floors that we like and were very excited to have them installed. However, the whole project turned out to be a disaster.

We have purchased 20% more floors just in case but we ran out of floors- we don’t have enough floors to finish family room/dining room and staircase! The floors are high quality and there were no damaged floors in the boxes. The lead time to buy these floors is 6 months. Fortunately, we found 200 sq feet but of course they are from different batch and might not match with the floors we have.
We believe this is the fault of the installer. Initially when we hired him he said he will be installing floors but he hired some inexperienced workers that wasted and damaged lots of material. He only came for 5 mins a day and completely neglected the project.
The floors that they installed have cracks and scratches. They covered them with the boxes to protect but left nails under the boxes, stepped on them and made holes. They have nailed them so hard that the edges were damaged. The floors were covered in glue which they didn’t clean properly. In some places where they have cleaned the glue they have scratched the floors and removed the color and protective urethane layer. We can see it because the color is off and the light reflects differently on these spots, and also they feel different to touch. I will attach pictures. We have inspected only one small room for now and found many issues(you can see how many blue tape pieces we have put).

My questions:

Is the damage in these pictures acceptable? May be I am just being picky and may be that’s how the floors are done?
If it is not acceptable - what do we do? Can it be repaired? We used glue + nails installation. We paid 20k for these floors not counting additional 200 sq feet and not including the glue. Do we remove all the floors and start from scratch?😢
How to continue working with this contractor? He ruined the project, has been lying a lot and lost all our trust. Who should be responsible for the losses?
The quality is very important to us, we are building for ourselves and want everything to be perfect. We choose these floors because they had enough in stock and we could purchase the box from the same batch and see the color they we will get. Now we are forced to mix and to use floors from a different batch.

I would really appreciate any advice,
Thanks

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Comments (6)

An A
Original Author
2 years ago
Here are the photos
An A
Original Author
2 years ago
More photos
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Wow, there sure area lot of opinions about shoes on shoes off. As an agent, sometimes we are requested to remove shoes. Typically it is on meticulously clean homes. Most buyers don't mind, some grumble, but I have never had a buyer say they refuse to take their shoes off. It is the sellers home. They have the right to ask people to remove their shoes. When my children were babies and crawling around on the floor, no one was allowed to wear shoes in my house. I simply didn't want my babies crawling around in what was on the bottom of people's shoes, it could be anything! Being in thousands of homes in my career, I can tell you, I have seen floors that have been damaged because of a woman's high heel. There is no doubt about the mark. It looks like a nail head path of holes. It is from a heel where the little rubber thing has come off the shoe . Most people don't ask you to take shoes off because they are afraid you will damage the floors,they don't want the outside dirt on the floor. There are some cultures where it is a must. But the bottom line is,if there were signs and most likely this agent was told when making the appointment to please remove shoes, it should have been done.
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"Seems like a whole lot of wasted work ... could have been avoided" Seems like? Prices go up unneccesarily with this type of wrecklessness, on what are already expensive projects for consumers. I wonder how many floor layers the homeowner has lost for future sanding, to sand out these dips and such. Would love to know if the GC was trying to save money with his sub selection and what made him think he was good for the job to begin with. What criteria for the job he was meeting. Maybe they need to replace it now and give you the brand new floor you paid for. Installed by a professional. Don't accept it unless you are satisfied with your purchase. It's too bad and a catch 22 that we have to pay into these things before we see them. And good luck resolving and living thru all this! P.S. Who is paying for the expense of your moving out each time this is re-done? I hope it is not costing you more money to have to do this, just the inconvenience. This post was edited by snookums2 on Sat, Sep 13, 14 at 14:48
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Choosing the right flooring type isn't enough for your living condition. You will have to consider the types of cut: flat sawn, rift and quarter sawn, quarter sawn or live sawn. Quarter sawn and rift & quarter sawn will be best choices, because expansion and contraction is along the thickness of the wood. You will need climate control all year round. 70 degrees at 40 % relative humidity is where you want to be throughout the year. The use of a humidifier/dehumidifier will be needed year round. Although, engineered flooring is more stable than solid. Using the wrong wood specie in your living condition can run the risk of de-laminating with engineered wood. If, the top veneer is more or less stable than it's core and backing. You will experience de-laminating in extreme humidity swings. Take in account of what the engineered flooring is constructed of: mdf or plywood. The width of the flooring will account for how much expansion and contracting also. 2 1/4" strips are the most stable. As you go wider, expect to see more wider seasonal gaps. Proper acclimating is critical, should be performed with a moisture meter. For 2 1/4" strip flooring , sub-floor and flooring moisture should be within 4%. For all other widths 2% moisture differentiation is allowed or should not be exceeded. Don't forget proper expansion gaps, which is the thickness of your flooring, example: 3/4" thick = 3/4" gap. Sub-floor type and condition will affect the performance of wood floors. All this needs to be considered for the proper and successful performance of your wood floors.
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We do not like criticizing other's work because sometimes we don't know the circumstances leading up to why certain things were done they way they were. However, with that being said, unfortunately this is not acceptable. We would NEVER leave a project with this outcome. 1st photo. The swirl marks are from the edger. We go a step further in our finishing process to remove these. While you may have a couple throughout an entire job(because on site sanding is prone to some human mistakes) what you have on your project is not acceptable. 2nd photo. Was the hardwood damaged thus causing discoloration? If not, the stain they applied is not blended correctly at all. 3rd photo. There seems to be some debris still in the finish. You normally see this in between the coats of polyurethane but at the last coat these are completely buffed out and the floor is smooth. If you didn't have some of the other issues mentioned above- all that would be needed is a screen and re coat. However, because of the swirl marks and blotchy stain application is that particular area photographed- you may need to have the floors sanded and refinished again. Dark stains tend to accentuate some of the discrepancies in the sanding process more so than a lighter color or natural finish.
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An A
Original Author
2 years ago
One more
SJ McCarthy
2 years ago
The scratches are after the fact. One of the cracks you are showing is the natural ring of a tree that has some depth to it. That one's fine. The edge crushing should not be there. That is installer error.

Since you are missing a HUGE amount of your square footage, your GENERAL CONTRACTOR has to deal with all of this. All of it. It will be an expensive lesson for him/her to learn. They are responsible for proper installation.

GC's (not all....but most) like to save money where they can. They will use their 'hammer swingers' to install stuff like tiles, hardwood, toilettes, etc. They choose not to use professional tile setters, hardwood flooring installers, etc. Those pros cost the GC MONEY. So they do what they have always done and send out some of their 'dudes' to throw in a wood floor.

Today you have seen the results of that. This is an expensive lesson that the GC MUST LEARN. The GC owes you ALL of that extra wood. All of it. You have just discovered what happens when you try to use other dye lots....it doesn't work.

I would personally push for full removal and installation of a 'like' wood floor. The GC would pay for bringing in the wood AND the removal of the old and installation...and all labour costs. The GC will find out how quickly his profits on this part of the project disappear.

This is a lesson the GC must learn...so LET HIM/HER learn it. The other option: get ALL of the flooring budget BACK (all of it) plus the labour costs to remove the floor (yep...) and then HIRE someone ELSE when you take possession of the house at a later date.
An A
Original Author
2 years ago
Thanks for the advice! The are owner builders, so there is no GC. We have hired the flooring contractor by the recommendation of the flooring store. He is using their license as well. He sent us the contract that had floor store name on the license. I don’t think he will voluntarily agree to cover the costs, so most likely we will have to go to the to court to sue him. This whole process will take time and money as lawyers are expensive. We are currently spending 4K a month for rent and were planning to move in to our house in a month.
Also, our floors are badly covered in glue as they didn’t clean it properly. I was googling yesterday about the glue marks on the hardwood and found out that it is impossible to clean them without damaging the floors if it was not done within 24 hours. Thats how it looks like - glue and dirt that stuck to the glue- please see the pictures.
SJ McCarthy
2 years ago
The Flooring company is the GC for your floor. The installer is using the licence AND paperwork of the company. The company is responsible for everything you are complaining about.

Contact the OWNER of the floor store and get them in there. Also point out the DIRECT connection between the installer and his/her company.

Do all of this via text/email with pictures. This is the beginning of your legal documentation...and the OWNER will know it! If s/he doesn't then they are about to find out!

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