You can buff out small scratches or indentations from your hardwood floor, but refinishing is your best bet if you have larger areas that need work. Floors in relatively good shape but have lost their luster can be restored with thorough buffing. If your finish has worn off in areas or if you have sun or water damage, you should go with refinishing instead.
Floor polishing isn’t technically necessary, but it will help your floors last longer and hold up better to scratches. Floor polish is a thin coating that fills in small abrasions on your floor and makes them less visible, and it can act as a protective covering that prevents future damage to the floor underneath. Floor polish helps protect against water and moisture, so it’s a great service if you want to extend the lifespan of your floors. Additionally, polish makes your floors shine, making your home look cleaner and more inviting.
To maintain tile and grout, clean the surfaces regularly with mild, non-abrasive cleaners and wipe up spills promptly to prevent buildup. It is also important to reseal the grout every 1-2 years to maintain its durability.
A floor polisher won’t remove scratches from a wood floor, but the polish can fill in surface scratches and make them all but invisible. If you run your fingernail gently over the scratch and it doesn’t catch, chances are that the polish will hide it. If it does catch, you might want to have your floors fully refinished, and you might need to have a professional floor sander in for particularly deep scratches. When in doubt, call a professional floor polisher to determine if polish will fill in your scratches or if you need more in-depth services.
You can use dish soap mixed with warm water to clean just about any type of flooring, and while vinegar is a great addition to some floor cleaners, it’s not a good idea to use it on wood flooring or engineered wood flooring. Vinegar is very acidic, and it can gradually eat away at the protective finish on wood floors. If you’re cleaning laminate, tile, concrete, or vinyl floors, feel free to use vinegar and water in a 1-to-1 ratio with a few drops of dish soap. For wood floors, substitute the vinegar for olive oil.
The Mullen, NE homeowners’ guide to floor polishing services
From average costs to expert advice, get all the answers you need to get your job done.
Polished concrete floor costs depend on the size of the area you’re targeting and the style of concrete floor. Our guide breaks down all the cost factors.
It’s impossible to keep floors damage-free over the years. Thankfully, the cost to refinish hardwood floors is far less than the price tag to replace them altogether.
