If you have hardwood floors in kitchen...

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We currently have 30 year old hard wood floors (oak) in our kitchen. It is incredibly durable. We're replacing now because we're replacing the entire house, but it wore amazingly well. Past owners had lots of boys too, so it got abused. Tile doesn't last 30 years. It cracks and the grout gets stained. My last house had a tile floor and I hated the high maintenance of it. I had to mop weekly because the floor always looked splattered and streaked easily. It was 5 year old tile and there were chips already. One especially bad chip was from a wine bottle that broke.

Tile doesn't last 30 yrs? We have 30 yr old tile in our old townhouse that we left in when reno'ing the kitchen, and it's some cheapish 12x12 tile. Yes there are a few cracks in some (due to improper installation), but it wasn't the fault of the tile. We put in some good tile in the basement and you could literally drop a hammer from 3 ft (I did it a cpl times) and it won't chip the tile, much less crack it. If you use a good porcelain tile (as opposed to cheap builder grade ceramic) that's 3/8" thick, you have a proper subfloor (many homeowners improperly install tile and/or don't have a proper subfloor), the stuff is incredibly durable and will long outlast wood. Drop a chef's knife on HW floor and you could be left with an ugly chip. Same thing with tile and it won't even leave a knick.

Now don't get me wrong, wood can be fairly durable, but it's just no comparison to tile. Ya it needs mopping but HW floor needs mopping too if you want it clean.

Like I said, ultimately hey, do what floats your boat, but a good tile floor is borderline bomb proof.

[Anonymous]

We just moved out of a house with hard wood floors in the kitchen and they were always clean. I vacuumed or swiffered them often. I used a wet swiffer or a mop occasionally, but I just made sure to keep them clean on a daily basis. They always looked great and were very easy to clean. I loved it. I have tile now and it doesn't look as clean.