CARPET
BUYING GUIDE

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If you're reading this page, you're probably about to buy a new carpet. Congrats! Having a new carpet is awesome, and it makes a home look so much better.

However! Buying a carpet might be somewhat complicated. If you don't know what you're doing, you could end up buying a super expensive carpet that won't last that long.

Don't worry! That won't happen to you. That's why I wrote this ULTIMATE GUIDE. In this guide we'll be covering many topics. The most important of which are: the 5 Things You Must Know Before Buying a Carpet, Best Carpet Brands & Types of Shops, How to Find the Best Carpet Installers, Your Carpet's Lifespan and How to Take Care of Your Carpet.

All of them are very important topics! But since I don't want to make this guide extremely lengthly, I'm linking to the main pages of this website where you'll find all the information.

It's great to have on board.

1. The 5 Things You Must Know Before Buying a Carpet

First things first, you need to know what carpet you want. And in order to know what carpet you want, you need to know a little bit about carpets. If not, the carpet dealer will sell you whatever carpet it is they make more money with. Trust me, I've seen it in the past.

But carpets aren't really that complicated! You only have to worry about 5 things. Just 5 things and you're done! Trust me, if you know these 5 concepts before you set foot in the carpet store, your buying experience will be completely different.

These are the concepts:

• 1. Carpet Styles: You need to know about the different Carpet Styles. I'm sure you've heard about Saxony, Berber, Frieze, Cut and Loop... These are the styles you'll be choosing from!
• 2. Carpet Fibers: There are many different types of carpet materials. Most people are familiar with the difference between natural and synthetic, but that's just the tip of the iceberg. You'll have to be familiar with terms such as Polypropylene, Plefin, Polyester, the different types of Nylon, etc.
• 3. Carpet Padding: You need to know about Carpet Padding or backing. Padding is what goes under the carpet, and it makes a huge difference in the carpet's lifespan. There are many types (like Urethane foam, Rebond pad, waffle rubber pad, memory rubber pad, etc.) and specifications you should know about (like thickness, density, etc.). Trust me, choosing the wrong padding is the biggest mistake carpet buyers make. Click here to learn everything about carpet padding!
• 4. Carpet Pile: Carpet Pile is the same as saying carpet fibers. But it has nothing to do with materials! It's about how high the fibers are (high pile, medium pile, and low pile) and it's about the fiber's style (cut vs loop pile). There are a couple of concepts you must be familiar with (carpet pile height, carpet face-weight, and carpet density) to make the right decision. Click here to learn more about carpet pile!
• 5. Carpet Tuft: And last but not least, you have to know about Carpet Tuft. Carpet tuft is how many times the fibers twist. This is very important to make sure that you're buying a high quality carpet.

To help you get to know these concepts, we have 5 posts that explain each one of them in depth. I would strongly recommend that you need them:

2. Best Carpet Brands & Types of Shops

Now that you know enough about carpets, it's time to go and buy a carpet! But where should you go? There are many types of shops, which one is best?

We wrote a post on the 8 best (and worst) places to buy a carpet. They go from Home Depot and other big-box stores, to franchises, and locally-owned stores. Everything you want to know about is in that post! I would strongly encourage you to read that post before you go buy a carpet.

We also added a new post on the best carpet brands. I honestly think it's not as important as knowing where to buy the carpet, but since that is something our readers wanted to know, we added it to this section.

These are the 2 guides if you want to check them out:

3. How to Find The Best Carpet Installers?

This is the most important question you can ask yourself if you want to save money. Most people don't change their carpet very often, so it's unlikely that you'll "have a guy" that will install your carpet perfectly.

In order to find the best carpet installer, the best thing you can do is request multiple carpet installers for a quote. You'll find the best carpet installers and at a very good price!

How to request for multiple quotes?

You can either loose a lot of time googleing for carpet installers near you, or you could use an online service that will do it for you. You'll get the best possible price and you'll be able to see reviews from other clients. It's the absolute best way to find carpet installers anywhere!

The 2 platforms that I would recommend are Thumbtack and Homeadvisor. I like Thumbtack a little better, because it's easier to use and the pros seem like they care about every client more. On Homeadvisor, it's more about the numbers (the more jobs you do, the more you get paid). But you can use either of them! They're excellent services.

4. Carpet Lifespan: Is Cheaper Always Better?

Now that you know so much, it's time to give you the ULTIMATE BUYING WEAPON! I created a FREE calculator that will allow you to see how long your carpet should last. The number of years depends on the amount of traffic your carpet will have, but also on the specifications that we talked about earlier like: padding, tuft, material, pile, etc. Click here to see the calculator!

In this post I explain everything you need to know about the lifespan calculator:

5. How To Take Care of Your New Carpet?

Last, but not least, you need to learn how to take care of you new carpet. If you know how to take care of it, it will last a lot longer! We have a whole section on the ULTIMATE CARPET CLEANING GUIDE. But in case you just want to take a sneak peak, these are some of the posts:

Conclusion

And that's it! I really hope you found this guide helpful. If you have a question or there's anything that you'd like to see, you can send us a message through the Ask an Expert section.

And if you'd like to see more, we also have similar guides on: Carpet Cleaning, Hiring a Carpet Installer, Vacuum Cleaners or Buying a Rug.