What this covers, and what it doesn't
This service covers dry-area floor coverings: engineered wood, laminate, LVT (luxury vinyl tile/plank) and carpet, supplied and fitted across living rooms, bedrooms, hallways, stairs and landings, along with the subfloor preparation those coverings need to perform properly. It does not cover hard tile in wet areas. Porcelain, ceramic or natural stone tiling in bathrooms, wet rooms, kitchens and utility areas is a different trade with different substrate requirements (tanking, waterproof tile backer boards, movement joints around wet zones) and sits under our <a href='/tiling-contractors-london'>tiling contractors London</a> service, not this one. The two are often confused because both involve floor finishes, but the failure modes are completely different: a dry-area floor covering fails from moisture rising up through the slab or from movement in a timber subfloor, while a wet-area tiled floor fails from water getting in from above through a cracked grout line or unsealed junction. If your job spans both, a kitchen with LVT running into a tiled utility area, for example, we scope and price each substrate correctly rather than treating the whole floor as one job.
Why London's housing stock behaves so differently underfoot
A Victorian or Edwardian terrace typically has a suspended timber ground floor: joists spanning between sleeper walls with a void underneath, sometimes ventilated by airbricks, sometimes not, and often with a mix of original floorboards, later chipboard patches and at least one previous owner's attempt at levelling. These floors move seasonally and can have real deflection, especially near bay windows and in rooms that have had a wall removed. A 1930s semi is more likely to have a solid concrete ground floor from the outset, but early concrete slabs frequently have no damp-proof membrane at all, or one that has since failed. Ex-council flats and maisonettes built from the 1960s onward are almost always solid concrete construction, and because they're most often mid-terrace or mid-block units surrounded by other heated flats, the moisture and shared-structure issues show up differently again, less rising damp from the ground, more residual construction moisture or condensation trapped under an old sealed vinyl. Each of these three profiles needs a different subfloor strategy before a covering goes down, which is why we survey rather than quote a single flooring price off a floor plan.
What actually drives the cost
Material tier is the biggest single factor: engineered wood ranges from around £40–£50 per m2 for a budget oak-veneer board up to £80–£100+ per m2 for a wide-plank premium finish, before fitting; LVT material runs roughly £15–£25 per m2 budget to £50–£60 per m2 for a premium herringbone-effect plank; laminate material sits around £12–£35 per m2 depending on thickness and water-resistance; carpet ranges from around £15–£25 per m2 for polypropylene through £25–£45 per m2 mid-range twist pile to £45–£90+ per m2 for wool or wool-blend, plus £3–£14 per m2 for underlay. Subfloor prep is the second big variable: self-levelling compound typically adds £15–£30 per m2 supplied and applied, and a full screed replacement where the existing floor is badly out or a damp-proof membrane needs installing can add £30–£40 per m2 on top of that. Removal and disposal of old flooring (especially old glued-down carpet gripper and adhesive residue on concrete) typically adds £5–£10 per m2. Door undercuts, new threshold strips and reinstating skirting are usually priced per door/run rather than per m2, and stairs cost more per step than open floor because of the extra cutting and nosing detail.
How long the work actually takes
A straightforward LVT or laminate re-fit over a sound, level subfloor in a single room can be done in a day. Add carpet across a whole flat and most jobs run one to two days depending on the number of rooms and staircases. Engineered wood needs its acclimatisation period factored in first, typically 48-72 hours on site in the room it will be fitted, longer in winter when a property has been unheated, before a single board is laid, so a full-flat engineered wood job is realistically a three to five day job even though the fitting itself might only take two of those days. Any subfloor levelling compound or screed needs its own curing time before a covering can go down on top of it, usually 24-72 hours for self-levelling compound depending on depth and ventilation, and longer for a full sand-and-cement screed, so a job that needs significant subfloor work before fitting can add several days to the overall programme. Access also matters: a ground-floor flat with street parking for a van is quicker to service than a third-floor walk-up flat where every board and bag of compound has to be carried up.
Regulations and sign-off most homeowners don't expect
Building Regulations Approved Document C covers site preparation and resistance to moisture, which is the general principle behind fitting a damp-proof membrane over a solid concrete floor before any covering goes down, particularly relevant in basement and lower-ground rooms and older concrete slabs that predate current DPM standards. Approved Document E covers sound insulation between dwellings, and this is the one that catches out leaseholders specifically: most London flat and maisonette leases include a clause requiring carpet, or hard flooring laid over an acoustic underlay meeting a stated impact sound rating, precisely because a downstairs neighbour's ceiling transmits footfall noise from LVT or engineered wood laid without proper acoustic underlay far more than it does from carpet. Approved Document M covers access, and its principles are the reason we pay attention to threshold height differences at entrances and between rooms rather than just butting two floor heights together. None of this normally requires a Building Control application for a straightforward domestic re-fit, but ignoring the acoustic underlay requirement in a leasehold flat is the single most common way a flooring job turns into a dispute with a freeholder or a downstairs neighbour months after the fitter has gone.
The most common mistakes we find in other people's previous flooring work
No expansion gap left around the perimeter of a floating floor, so engineered wood or laminate has nowhere to move seasonally and ends up peaking or bowing at a wall or a fitted unit within a year. Skirting nailed straight through a floating floor into the subfloor below, which pins the floor down and defeats the point of a floating installation, then cracks or lifts the covering when it tries to expand anyway. LVT or laminate fitted directly over old carpet gripper rods or leftover adhesive without lifting them properly, leaving a visible ridge under the new covering. No damp-proof membrane under LVT or engineered wood on a ground-floor concrete slab, which traps whatever residual moisture is in the concrete and can eventually delaminate the covering or cause a musty smell. Underlay with the wrong tog rating fitted over underfloor heating, which insulates the heat rather than letting it through and leaves rooms cold no matter how high the thermostat is turned up. Doors left uncut after a floor build-up increased by even a few millimetres, so they drag or won't close.
Repair, refinish or full replacement: a decision framework
Engineered wood with a decent wear layer (2-4mm plus a lacquered finish) can usually be sanded and refinished once or twice over its life rather than replaced, which is worth checking before assuming a scratched or dulled floor needs ripping out; a professional sand and refinish typically costs a fraction of a full replacement. Individual LVT or laminate click planks can sometimes be lifted and swapped if damage is localised, but only if the covering was fitted without adhesive and the pattern allows it, gluing down or fully bonded LVT generally means a damaged section has to be cut out and patched rather than swapped cleanly. Carpet doesn't have a repair tier in the same way, once the pile is crushed, stained or the backing has failed at the seams, replacement is the only real option, though a professional carpet clean can buy meaningful time before that point. Where the underlying issue is the subfloor rather than the covering, movement, damp, or a slope that's gotten worse, refinishing or patching the covering only delays the real fix and the subfloor problem should be addressed first regardless of which covering goes back down.
Flooring installation versus structural subfloor work
This service covers finishing floors, not fixing them structurally. If a survey finds sagging or bouncy joists, rot in a suspended timber floor, or a concrete slab that's cracked and moving rather than just uneven, that's a structural carpentry or concrete repair job that needs addressing before any new covering is fitted on top, and we'll flag it rather than levelling over a problem that's going to keep moving. Where a floor is being taken up as part of a wider insulation upgrade, adding insulation between joists in a suspended timber floor, for instance, that overlaps with retrofit work covered under <a href='/eco-retrofit-refurbishment-london'>eco retrofit refurbishment London</a>, and we'll sequence the two so insulation goes in before the new floor covering rather than as a separate job that disturbs a finished floor a second time.
Leasehold, shared blocks and neighbour disputes
Most London flats, whether ex-council or purpose-built, are held on a lease that says something specific about floor coverings, commonly a requirement for carpet or for hard flooring to be laid over an acoustic underlay meeting a minimum impact sound rating. Some leases require written consent from the freeholder or managing agent before replacing carpet with a hard covering at all. Before ripping out carpet for LVT or engineered wood in a leasehold flat, it's worth checking the lease and, where required, getting consent and specifying underlay that actually meets the stated rating, not just 'acoustic-sounding' underlay bought on price. This is separate from the Party Wall etc. Act 1996, which applies to structural work on party walls and doesn't generally cover floor coverings, but a downstairs neighbour who starts hearing every footstep after a floor swap is a real and common source of complaint in blocks of flats, and it's far cheaper to get the underlay right the first time than to relay a floor after a dispute.
Why the order of operations matters
Subfloor assessment and moisture testing happens before any covering is chosen, because a damp reading can rule out certain products (some engineered wood ranges won't warranty over underfloor heating or high residual moisture, for instance) before you've fallen in love with a sample. Levelling compound or screed goes down and cures before skirting is removed and doors are trimmed, because trimming to the wrong finished floor height means doing it twice. Underlay and the covering itself go down before skirting is reinstated and threshold strips are fitted, so the finished skirting line sits correctly against the new floor rather than leaving a gap that gets filled with sealant as a workaround. Getting this sequence wrong is the most common reason a flooring job overruns: a fitter arrives to lay boards, discovers the floor is 6mm out over a run, and either has to stop and level on the day (adding a day of curing time nobody budgeted for) or fits over the unevenness anyway, which is how boards start telegraphing dips within months.
End-of-tenancy and landlord turnaround flooring
Flooring replacement is one of the most common triggers for a landlord instructing work between tenancies, alongside a repaint and general reinstatement, because worn carpet or scratched laminate is one of the first things a prospective tenant notices on a viewing. LVT has become the default choice for rental turnarounds in London because it tolerates a fast-changing occupancy better than carpet (no staining, easier to clean between lets) and better than solid engineered wood (less sensitive to the odd scuff or dropped object), while staying within a landlord's budget at roughly £45–£90 per m2 supplied and fitted. Where a flooring swap is part of a wider turnaround, repainting, minor plastering repairs, updating fixtures, we coordinate directly with the broader programme under <a href='/property-refurbishment-london'>property refurbishment London</a> so the flooring goes in at the right point in the sequence (after wet trades, before final clean) rather than as an isolated job that risks damage from work still going on around it.