Elm Flooring

These guys are great. Growing up, we did our own floors.. what a huge pain. We got a bunch of estimates, and the prices from Elm were great, just as much as price 2 things stand out: 1) Quality of the work: their floors look great, they fix busted boards so well you'd never know they broke etc, etc, etc 2) Ease working with them, they do great estimates, they show up on time, they dont choke your house with sanding dust.. We had elm do our whole house, then my parents had them do some of their house

Great! I'm about to hire them again for another job. Also recommended to a relative and they were highly satisfied.

The crew was very punctual every morning and worked hard to get the job done. Adam was very responsive to concerns I had once the job was under way and immediately revised and made corrections. There were a couple spots during the final finish that needed to be re-coated and this was taken care of right away. Neither Adam nor any of his employees acted as if it was a bother; you could tell that they took pride in their work and they wanted to make it right for me. I thought the price was fair and Adam was very helpful in the planning process and offered suggestions in the selection of wood. I would definitely hire Elm Floor do due additional work if/when the need arises.

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Our real estate broker recommended them for price and quality, and they lived up to the billing. We have a relatively large house and did all of the first floor, the stairway, and the hallway of the second floor. The job took ~8 days, during which we left town (highly recommended). The final result was beautiful with excellent detailing. It is now 6 months later and the floor finish holds up well to chairs and other abuse. I recall some concern about cleanup from other reviewers and their contract warns that they are not responsible for dust from sanding or the final cleaning; however, the house was left in good condition and nicely broom clean. Having been through this now, the reality is that you will be living with fine wood dust for a couple months afterwards, and from any contractor.
My only knock, and it is more of a caution, is that their communication skills are not the best and English is not the first language. The head guy (whose name escapes me) was very nice but you need to follow up on all the details. They are clearly a small company so phone calls can take a day or two to get answered. Tips for working with Elm and for this sort of work in general:
1. They will want you to sign off on the stain and finish on the day they start, sanding down a small portion of the floor then applying stain and asking and quot;how do you like thatand quot;. Make them come out the day before. You want to live with the sample and let it dry before deciding.
2. The more you can seal off cabinets and unaffected rooms with painters tape, the less cleanup when they are done. Insist in the contract that they do this.
3. If it's a big job, schedule it during a vacation.
4. We moved all of the little items off the affected areas/floors but left for them the large pieces like tables, sofas, etc.
Elm Floor is highly recommended. (Note: I wrote Angie's that Elm in River Forest is the same as Elm in Elmwood Park.)

When we moved into our new (120 year old house) in Oak Park, two of the bedrooms had carpeted flooring. We did not love the carpet so we decided to see what was under it. There were hardwood floors underneath - but they were not in great shape. It was definitely NOT one of those and quot;look at these gorgeous floors, how can anyone cover these!and quot; moments. They were beat, splintering, had plywood replacement boards, and just overall looked pretty bad. They had obviously not seen the light of day in probably 60 years. So we started calling flooring guys for estimates.
The first guy said they were not worth repairing. They were pine, and soft. He tried to sell us on a new floor to the tune of $4,000. The next guy was fine and gave us a quote for $1800.
Then we called Adam at Elm Floor who was referred to us from another contractor. Adam came out that afternoon to take a look. He said that they would look great when refinished. Apparently heart pine isn't exactly made anymore, so when it's gone, it's gone. We made the executive decision to restore them. After all, these were original floors.
Adam and his team came out that next week and did the job in two days. I was blown away at how nice they looked. They replaced about 15 boards throughout the two rooms .. Luckily Adam had some pine inventory that matched really well. I was also surprised at how clean these guys kept things. I was expecting to walk into a house full of dust, and it really wasn't bad.
After the floors were safe to walk on, I did notice a couple spots that were a little rough and I wanted repaired. Adam came out right away .. agreed that they needed to be fixed, and sent his guys 2 days later to do it. They looked perfect.
Great experience with Elm Floor. I will definitely be calling them when we need to downstairs refinished.

The oak floor was under carpet for 40+ years and generally in good shape except for some ugly pine boards. Elm Floor replaced the pine with oak, sanded, stained and varnished the floor. It looks fabulous! It is very difficult to see which are the newer boards. The workers were always very early (awkward for me at times)) and were polite although their English was limited. When they were finished everything was perfectly cleaned up.
While they were sanding, they taped the entrance to the room in such a way that I did not find particles in other rooms.
The only negative is lack of communication with the workers and Adam, the owner, is not always available to interpret.
In summary, the work is excellent at a fair price and I highly recommend them.

Are overall experience was great. The were extremely responsive and finished the entire job in about 4 days. We had not moved into the house yet and were grateful that this project did not linger on.