New Carpet DIY

One great way to save money and boost the look of your home in any kind of economy is to replace carpet yourself. Tom usually replaces living room carpet about every 3-5 years. The living room is heavy used in the Gabriel household and it is directly adjacent to Tom’s busy shop area. It is an agreement that Tom keeps with his wife (me) faithfully. We thought we’d show everyone how easy and inexpensive it really is to give any room a fresh new look.
Home improvement stores, like Home Depot or Lowes, carry large rolls of various types of flooring. The first step in selecting a new carpet is to find one with the style and feel you like. It is important to take note of the weight of carpet on the small tags that label each roll, the higher the weight, the better. It is also a good idea to visit the store before a trip to actually purchase the carpet and pick up small samples to bring home and place in the area you are re-carpeting to see if it matches existing trim, paint, furniture, etc. Measure out the entire area to establish square footage needed. Most carpet rolls come in either twelve foot or fourteen foot lengths.
We selected a thirty-five weight carpet from Home Depot call “Sand Dollar”. It has a light base with various shades of brown speckled through out. It came on a twelve foot roll.
The first step in replacing carpet is to remove the existing carpet. If the carpet pad underneath is still good, you can simply vacuum the pad using the one of the higher setting on your vacuum cleaner. You can also take the hose attachment and clean around existing baseboard and tile. There should already be tack strip placed around the perimeter of your carpeted area. If not, tack strip can be picked up from Home Depot as well. The only other tools you may need are a chisel shaped tool used to tuck in the carpet edges, a carpet knife which looks like a box cutter but has a blade on each side, and a carpet knee kicker.
After cleaning off your area and gathering the needed tools, you can roll out the entire roll making sure to match up at least one corner and along one wall. Use the chisel tool to tuck the new carpet by wedging it under the baseboard and tile or other bordering flooring. Make sure to stretch out the carpet as you go using a carpet knee kicker. Carefully use a carpet blade knife to trim any carpet that does not fit the area. If your area is wider than the roll you purchased, then seaming your carpet will be necessary. Seaming carpet will be covered in another article.
Once again, purchasing and laying carpet yourself is a great way to save money and can be done in relatively little time.