Regular cleaning, avoiding harsh chemicals, and periodic resealing extend its lifespan.

The answer to this question depends on how large the room is and how much experience you have stripping and waxing floors. It will take at least 24 hours to strip the floors, then you must allow time for drying, waxing, waiting for them to cure, and, finally, buffing them. Since you likely will not be working for the full 24 hours, it is safe to say that this is a two- or three-day job.

Yes, you can polish an existing concrete floor—as long as the slab is structurally sound and in good shape. In fact, that’s what makes this type of flooring upgrade so appealing. Polishing works best on bare concrete with minimal surface damage, although you can usually repair cracks and stains before the grinding and buffing begins. Instead of ripping out your existing concrete floor, polishing it can turn it into a high-shine showpiece that’s both practical and sleek.

Before starting on a full refinishing project, determine if your floors need to be completely sanded down to the bare wood or if the damage is shallow and mostly cosmetic. Deep scratches and gouges will require you to rough sand using a drum sander or belt sander, but small surface scratches or floors that have only lost their luster don’t need a complete overhaul. Instead, you can skip the rough sanding step and sand-screen the old finish with a buffer, removing only the top layer of polyurethane.