We got a quote of $250 to "possibly" fix some small damage to our vinyl floor near the dishwasher, but the repairman never called back. Sigh. We also got a ballpark quote of $2500-3500 to replace our 200 square foot kitchen floor with anything else. Bah.
Well, after pricing out laminate flooring at Home Depot, Lowe's, and Costco, we found this place in Fremont, Universal Floor Covering at 4500 Automall Parkway near Fremont Blvd. We worked with a gentleman named Sam, and his number is 510-659-9553. He had some Armstrong brand laminate flooring for only $1.74 per square foot. The entire price including underlayment and tax came to less than $500. When we picked it up, we bought an extra couple of boxes with which we hope to later replace the hallway tile as well.
Mary found this web page that shows how to install an Armstrong laminate floor:
http://www.internetfloors.com/armstrong_laminate_installation.asp
She also found this page that shows how to remove a ceramic tile floor, possibly the hardest part of the process, but something we will save until later anyway:
http://www.homedepot.com/prel80/HDUS/EN_US/diy_main/pg_diy.jsp
Mary's brother-in-law Jerry Bacho installed a floating hardwood floor when they remodeled last winter. There are some big differences between hardwood and laminate, mostly when it comes to cutting, but the preparation is the same and the installation procedures are similar. I'm sure he will be big help to us when we start this project. Jerry? Jerry? Where are you?
The nice guy in the "Tool Corral" at OSH found us the proper circular saw blade for cutting laminate. It takes a little searching to find the right one.
