Don't cover your old hardwood with tile or carpet. As long as there are no wide sagging areas, extensive squeaky spots or moldy boards, you should be able to salvage even the scruffiest looking hardwood floor, and here are four reasons why you should.

Natural Hardwood Floors Are Realtors' Dream Floor Covering 

If you intend to sell your home, those hardwood floors are a major selling point. Millennials and other home buyers favor hardwood floors for a number of reasons.

Wood flooring is hypoallergenic and can be finished with a number of people-friendly stains and waxes. The unique worn finishes on hardwood floor planks also make a beautiful contrast to minimalist and Euro-style furnishings.

Today's home buyers love buying homes that are sustainable and have character. Refinished hardwood flooring can last at least as long as 20 years and even longer than 100 years with the proper care. That's about as green as it gets. As for character, individual hardwood floors are one-of-a-kind without even trying.

Hardwood Floors Make Decorating Easy

Not only do hardwood floors lend themselves to any kind of decor, they also allow you to easily change color schemes and styles over the lifetime of your home. Easily swap out area rugs under dining tables and in living areas whenever you update the interior decor of these rooms.

In contrast, wall-to-wall carpeting or tiles may look dated or clash with new color schemes and furnishing styles down the road.

If your hardwood floors are solid wood that hasn't been sanded too much, you can sand the floors several times if you ever want to change your floor stain color. Hardwood floors can be stained, painted, stenciled or bleached.

Your hardwood flooring professional is a great source to learn the pros and cons of choosing various colors when you have kids, pets and other challenges with your flooring.

Old Hardwood Floors Are Easily Patched

The straightforward, reliable construction of older floors makes them easy to repair. Whether there are old pet stains, holes in your flooring or warped boards, qualified flooring experts will take out the damaged wood planks, replace them and stain the floor to match the existing flooring.

If most rooms in your home have hardwood floors but the floor in one room is beyond repair, it's easy to replace the flooring in the one room to match the rest of the home's flooring. Reclaimed wood and wood of similar species and size can be installed and stained to look nearly identical to the flooring in the rest of the home.

Hardwood Floors Can Be Sealed and Cleaned Your Way

You decide how much shine your floors will have. You can opt for an unvarnished hardwood floor that you routinely buff with wax. Or go with a varnished or urethane-finished surface that you mop with a silicone floor shine product to make it gleam.

Some people use mineral oil or specific natural waxes on their floors. They clean their floors with specialty products that have no toxins. Oil-based finishes can be used in kitchens and dining rooms, while tung oil and water-based finishes can be used in bedrooms and seating areas.

Contact K & Z Hardwood Flooring to learn more about repairing and refinishing your hardwood floors. We can custom finish your floor with precision sanding, stripping, staining, sealing and more.