Friday, March 21, 2008

~Floor problems~

It was not until we were doing our final walk-through of our home that I noticed the kitchen floor was not a linoleum, but rather sticky linoleum "tiles". So maybe that was why the previous owners had strewn dirty laundry throughout the house the day of our inspection? They wanted to draw attention away from the floors? (Seriously, there was laundry everywhere! Our realtor picked it up off the stairs so we could walk down without tripping! Baskets were everywhere all over the kitchen!)

I know that many designers on HGTV make use of these "marvelous" sticky tiles, and I have seen a job done correctly with them. But this is not a long-lasting floor solution! Unless the tiles are laid perfectly, there are gaps. Also, the tiles lose their stickiness and start to come up, or slip around.

So here's what the floor by my stove looked like:


I took off six tiles:


and now look (oooh, don't look too hard, I still haven't cleaned the floor/cupboard doors!):


There is still one tile in that area that has gaps. Honestly though, I could have removed the whole floor last night. Because once you start going, the rest of the floor looks bad too. But, I would have run out of tiles (at least the previous owner left a box and a half in the basement for us), and the tiles have lost some of their stickiness. So I'll be content that the huge gaps are gone!

6 comments:

Mrs.Vicki said...

I wonder if you pulled that last one up you could just use some linoleum adhesive to adhere it back down or some two sided tape. Just a thought :-) Your floor looks great though.
Are you ready for the snow today? Though I think here in Eaton county we will be getting more than you, they said what about 10 inches - we shall see..........
Vicki

Tori Leslie said...

Looks much better, great job you do-it-your-self-er!!

Sandi said...

is that hardwood, or plywood under the crummy tiles? I put that type of tile on my workbench in the garage so that is would be a nice surface for crafting, those started coming up also. So I put down carpet glue, and they are going anywhere now

Zintradi said...

we had those tiles in our kitchen and bathroom... they are disgusting...
We tore up the floor and put tile down in the bathroom and in the kitchen (4 years after moving in:-)) we layed a new floor over the crappy tile... It's a rubber product that has a wood patern on it... it goes together like snap together laminate, only instead of interlocking joints it has flaps that stick together.... great for the dogs and it came out to $2 a square foot we we finished. That price is comparable to 'no-glue' sheet vinyl.

Nicole said...

we need to do this also but have been putting it off. You have inspired me to get on the ball.

Tammy said...

Mrs. M--the tiles will break if not removed carefully. This tile is not any worse than about 12 others, so I'm just leaving it for now. :-)

Sandi--it is a subfloor of some sort. It isn't hardwood, more like pressed board. When we redid our floors in the living room and dining room, we looked to see if there were wood floors in the kitchen too, but there weren't. :-(