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Look, this stuff is garrrrbagggeee! I’m not going to sugar coat it, this stuff sucks. Vinyl plank or “click N lock” vinyl flooring super trendy right now and it’s probably the most common floor you’ll find in your standard cookie cutter fix N flip house. If you’re home shopping or just DIY drooling on your keyboard then you’ve probably seen a ton of this stuff. It’s advertised as “heavy duty” and “water proof” but I can assure you its neither. I FN hate it.

Why?

# 1 – Installation:

The sales rep at whatever store you go to will most likely say ” oh its easy to install, anyone can do it.” and ok, pretty much anyone can put it on the floor, yes, but about 95% of you are going to “F” it up when you put it down. I’m not trying to sound arrogant here but the joints and edges on this stuff is so fragile that you really have to attention to what you’re doing in order to not “F” it up. The edges and the ends are so fragile that the slightest improper angle with a soft mallet and BOOM you’ve ruined another piece. If you make a mistake and need to pull a piece up you’ll likely ruin that piece and surrounding pieces almost every time.

# 2 – The BS Warranty:

You’ll see a couple things on the box like “10 year warranty” or “water proof” etc. Well buyer beware! – the warranties all come with some lengthy fine print and most of these require specific subfloor, moisture barriers, surface prep (including moisture tests), installation by pros among other things. But there are two most important things to consider here: 1 – warranty or not, when the product fails you still have move all your furniture and rip up the entire floor to redo it. Who wants to do that? And 2 – IT IS NOT WATER PROOF AT ALL! The seams are not water proof, and the product is not durable AT ALL!

# 3 – Durability (lack of)

It is NOT heavy duty. The manufactures try to trick you with names that sound like they’re tough but I’m telling you they are weak sauce! This stuff is so soft that I have seen heavy furniture leave dimples in the floor like carpet. I was on a project a while back, we were about a week from turning the keys back over to the owner after a complete “move-out” renovation, and an electrician dropped a plastic spool of wire on the floor causing a HUGE gouge. This had to be repaired and the repair is not easy. This material is flexible and over time the center will flex but the seams do not. This causes the ends to break and the floor to literally move around in the room. Seriously, I’m real close to refusing to install this stuff ever again.

#4 False Advertising

This goes back to the warranty and the manufactures’ “heavy duty” or “commercial grade” claims. This is crap! It’s a total lie. Try a sample piece for yourself, you can easily break the seams, scratch the material or put dimples in it just by pressing into with a hard object. IT’S NOT DURABLE!

Most of these manufactures advertise these products as waterproof. IT IS NOT WATER PROOF AT ALL! The seams are not water proof! They aren’t tight enough to be water proof or even a little bit water resistant. I have pulled up thousands of sqft of this plank flooring that has water underneath it from leaks or spills within 24-48hr of the leak.

IT’S NOT WATER PROOF – IT’S NOT DURABLE – AT ALL!

#5 Reparability

I show how to make a repair in this video. It is possible but it is very difficult and the risk of damaging other surrounding pieces is high. The new piece will have to be glued in. These thin pieces are flexible and tend to resist staying in place. Even when you weigh the floor down until the glue dries the probability of having a repeat failure in that area is high. At least engineered wood (which is much thicker) can be pulled up and stop repairs can be made. With true hard wood, you can actually sand down the wood and re-finish it.

Conclusion – My Refusal to Install it Ever Again

At this point I will REFUSE to install it for any customer. I have had enough. If a customer wants this in their house they have to find someone else to do it. I don’t want my name on it and I don’t want to come back in a year for a warranty repair.

If you watch my rant video you can tell I have a strong distaste for any type of vinyl plank or click and lock style flooring. I have laid 10’s of thousands of sqft of it, I have ripped up just as much that has failed. I have never once seen it hold up to any claims the manufactures make across many brands. There are major issues with this product and we are now starting to see major failures with floors that are as recent as 1 year old to about 8 years max. IT’S CHEAP GARBAGE AND IT DOES NOT LAST! I wouldn’t recommend anyone install it unless #1 you are expecting a temporary fix (maybe 2 years max) and #2 it’s either free or almost free. – Seriously, don’t waste your labor. Stop buying this crap so we can watch it disappear off the shelves.