Should I buy carpet from a home improvement
warehouse?
Plenty of consumers buy carpet from a home improvement
warehouse and are perfectly happy with their purchase. On the flipside, there
are plenty of customers who are not happy with their carpet purchase and I
want you to know why.
I figure the goal of any home improvement store is to make it as
easy as possible for their customers to buy new carpet. They want you to come
into their store, pick out a carpet that looks good to you and sell it to you
in 45 minutes or less. Next, they typically collect all
the money upfront, order the carpet and schedule your carpet to be installed
in about two to four weeks from now.
What can
possibly go wrong...
Sometimes everything goes just
right and you end up a happy camper. Sometimes not. Soon
comes the day of installation. At this point you will be very excited. You
will have told all your friends about getting new carpet. Installation day: You
took the day off work, moved out the
furniture, made special arrangements for your pets or children and then the
phone rings.....
"Hi Mrs. Jones, this is Tom from the home
improvement store. Sorry, we can't install your carpet today there has been a
small problem." you are told. "What is the problem?" you
ask.
Maybe the carpet was never shipped, maybe it hasn't been
manufactured yet, maybe the truck was delayed due to bad weather. Maybe they
shipped the wrong carpet, maybe they shipped your carpet to the wrong store,
maybe the installer is sick. There could be any number of reasons why they
can't install your carpet when they said they would.
"Don't worry we will call you back later today and let you
know when we can install your carpet." Tom tells you.
So you wait all day. Nothing. No calls. You finally decide to call them back to see what is going on. You ask for Tom, but Tom
is gone so they transfer you to another salesperson named Bill. Bill
knows nothing about your carpet or your installation situation so you spend the
next five minutes telling him all about your problem and concerns. "Let
me look into this and call you back" says Bill.
Are you getting the picture?
This is the same treatment
you could endure if you have a complaint after your carpet is installed too. Does
it always go this way, of course not. Home improvement stores have plenty of
happy and satisfied customers. They are working hard to solve some of these
common complaints. You can read about common consumer complaints by doing a
search on the internet. They are easy to find. Should you buy carpet from a
home improvement store? You decide. But first read the rest of the
story.
Measuring your home for carpet.
Need them to measure how much carpet you need? They may charge you $30 to $75 to come out and measure
your home and it is not refundable if you don't buy carpet from them, However,
if you do buy from them it may be
applied to the carpet purchase.
Home Improvement stores don't pay their
employees at the top of the pay scale so they often hire people who may not
have very much experience. This is particularly true in the area of carpet and
flooring. Professionals with years of flooring experience are not generally
willing to work for $10 to $15 per hour. This means that the person who is
offering you advice or measuring your home may not be very good at it. What this means is that you
may be charged for more carpet then you actually need. At $20 to $40 per yard,
if you are "over-measured" just 10 yards can cost you an extra $200
to $400.
On the flipside of this, if the person measuring your
home makes a simple mistake and doesn't order enough carpet, then you will not have
enough carpet to finish the job. They won't discover this until they come to
install the carpet. You will have moved out the furniture and made many special
arrangements preparing to have your carpet installed. To their surprise they will have to reorder more carpet and come back to complete
the job in a few weeks. Sometimes the same carpet is not available or you
can't get the same dye-lot. Now you have carpet that doesn't match the rest of
the house.
Best Carpet Selection:
Not all carpet is created equal. Selecting the wrong
carpet can be a costly mistake. Don't expect carpet salespeople to steer you
in the right direction. They often know very little about the products they
sell. You have to buy a carpet that will meet your needs and lifestyle as well
as your budget. You can't just pick out a carpet that looks good and expect it
to do a good job for you. You have to buy the right carpet based on your own
special circumstances. Do you have kids? pets? How many people live in your
home? do you entertain often? How long do you want it to last? what is your
budget for this project? which rooms are you doing? These and many more
questions must be answered in order to determine which carpet will be
"right" for you.
This means you have to do your homework. You can't just
ask the salesperson at a home improvement store what they recommend. They do
not know what is "right" for you. Buying carpet is a large and
important expense that you must take very seriously. Buying carpet is not as
easy as it was 20 or 30 years ago. Do you know anything about carpet fibers?
Do you know anything about carpet styles? What makes one carpet better than
another? There is a lot to learn about carpet before you should buy. This is
the homework I am talking about.
Carpet Padding Choices
The same goes for padding. Choose the wrong padding and
you void the carpet warranty. Choose the wrong padding and your carpet will
not last as long as it was intended. Choose the wrong padding and you will pay
way too much for a newfangled product that will not benefit you. This advice
is not just for buying at home improvement stores, it applies to buying carpet
and pad at any carpet store. You have to do your homework in order to keep
from being ripped off or making a serious and costly mistake.
Carpet Installation Concerns
The same goes for carpet installation. Would you be able
to tell a good carpet install verses a bad carpet install? If installed
improperly, your carpet life span could be cut in half. Three out of four
carpet installers are not properly trained. This is one of the biggest
problems when buying carpet from a home improvement store. They have a hard
time finding qualified carpet installers who are willing to work with them.
Most home improvement warehouses now use an outside company to do their carpet
installations. If you have a problem it could be difficult to get a fast
remedy, if at all. So
how do you protect yourself? Knowledge is power. The
Complete Carpet Buying
Guide has all the answers you need and more.
Buying Carpet From Home Improvement
Stores
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