A Damaged Hardwood Floor in Our Master Bedroom

During the cold snap a few weeks ago our master bedroom floor developed some problems.  First it began to discolor in two area, on the right side of the bed and under the television.  Then one morning we discoverd that one of the 3 1/4 inch heart pine boards had splint crosswise.  I was not happy to see what had happened and after crawling under the house figured that condensation from the air conditioning trunk had expanded the wood and then the dry cold air had shrank it rapidly causing it to crack.

The first person I called was Daniel Sparks.  He owns Sparks floor finishing and did a great job refinishing our floors.  When he looked at what happened he said that it was water damage and that they floor would have to be repaired. He did not know the extent of the moisture damage under the wood floor and indicated that the cost to repair would be more than the deductible on our homeowners policy. 

I was holding off on making a claim until Mr. Sparks checked out the floor and at that point called our insurance agent.  After being contacted by an adjuster they stated that one of their contractors would come out and inspect the damage.  We met Dave the owner of Carpet One in Tallahassee along with his floor technician Bruce after work tonight at our house. 

They surveyed the damage, took some moisture readings and then explained their plan for correcting the problem.   Dave explained that since the current floor was built over an older wood floor and that they both went in the same direction his plan was to rip out the entire thing, salvage what he could and then using new heart pine to replace the damaged wood lay the floor back down perpendicular to the one underneath it.  While the demolition, reinstallation and refinishing are going on we will not have use of the bedroom or bathroom attached to it.

I could not have imagined that the process to repair the floor would be so involved.  The next step is for them to submit an estimate and report to the adjuster along with a sample of the floor.  Once that is done I expect that I will hear from the field adjuster in a few days.  I hope that we can get the process started as soon as possible so our bedroom and the rest of the house can be in order for Julia’s arrival.