Wood Flooring adds beauty and value to your home. With so many options to choose from, we would like to help make that decision easier by offering some basic information about your wood flooring options.

The main choices include:

* Solid Hardwood Flooring: A solid piece of hardwood, generally cut into 3/4" thick planks. Recommended for above ground; not recommended for concrete slabs. Solid Hardwood flooring comes unfinished, which is then installed and finished on-site; or prefinished, which is completely finished at the factory with several coats of durable finish, before it's ever delivered to your home, then simply nailed down. So, if you have decided on this option, now just figure out your what type of finish you want, of the many options.

* Engineered Hardwood flooring: are several plies of wood that are glued and laminated together to form a wood plank. Range in thickness from 1/4" to just over a half inch. Can be installed almost anywhere in your home, including over concrete.

* Longstrip Hardwood floors are engineered floors, but with a longer and wider plank, which allows the top layer to show 2 or 3 rows of thin hardwood strips.

* Exotic Hardwood Floors - Different hardwood specie from around the World. Not found in North America, these hardwood come from Australia, Africa, Brazil and the Far East. Exotic hardwoods offer unique wood graining and colorations. Many exotic floors are available in and in solid hardwood planks as well.

Another choice to consider with solid hardwood flooring, is whether to go with prefinished flooring, factory finished; or unfinished flooring, which is sanded and finished on site. Click here to read some advantages and disadvantages of both.

Wood flooring is offered in a variety of sizes. As outlined, thickness of the flooring generally ranges from 1/4" up to 3/4" for most solid hardwood. The width varies from 1" on up to about 6", with the most common sizes being 2-1/4" and 3" Each size will give a different look to your floor, so your decision should be based on your desired outcome and look you wish to achieve.

Wood is graded on scales, which set limitations and set rules on the number of defects and variations allowed for each grade. Each hardwood comes in a "clear" grade or "first grade", followed by "second" or "select" grade. You can view standard grading options used for oak flooring, as well as the difference between the milling, "plainsawn" or "quartersawn" here.