Luxury Vinyl Plank Flooring
Luxury vinyl plank took over rebuilds on the Gulf Coast because the plank itself does not care about water. Everything under and around it still does, and that is where the cost and the failures live.
- Houston metro
- Written scope before work begins
- Licensed trade subs where required
- Free estimate
Overview
Luxury Vinyl Plank Flooring
An LVP plank is a rigid core — usually stone-plastic composite, sometimes a foamed wood-plastic core — wearing a printed film and a clear urethane wear layer, with a click edge that locks to the next board. Nothing in that stack absorbs water. It installs as a floating floor over a slab or an existing hard surface, and a whole house can go in without touching the subfloor if the concrete is flat enough to start with.
The claim that gets stretched is waterproof. A waterproof plank means the board won’t swell, stain or delaminate if water sits on it. It does not mean the room is waterproof. Water finds the seams, spreads across the slab underneath and wicks into baseboards and drywall, where it stays. After a supply-line failure the planks often look untouched while the assembly beneath them is soaked, and drying that usually means pulling the floor up anyway.
The other thing quotes hide is preparation. A rigid core sits on the slab and reads every hump and dip: high spots create hollow, clicking sections, and low spots put stress on the locking edge until it separates. Getting the concrete flat — grinding, patching, sometimes a self-leveling pour — is the line item that varies most from house to house, and the one worth pinning down before you compare two prices.
The things that actually decide this job
Wear layer is the number that predicts wear
Plank thickness sells the product; the wear layer decides how long the print survives. It is quoted in mils, meaning thousandths of an inch, and a 6-mil floor in a hallway shows traffic lanes years before a 20-mil floor does. For a whole house with pets, 20 mil is the sensible floor to start from. Surface warranty length usually tracks the wear layer, which makes it a quick cross-check on any spec sheet.
Rigid core versus foamed core
Stone-plastic composite is dense and dimensionally stable, so it dents less under furniture legs and hides subfloor imperfection better, but it is hard and cool underfoot and louder without a good pad. Wood-plastic composite is lighter and softer to stand on, and it dents more readily under a piano leg or a loaded refrigerator. Kitchens and entries lean SPC; bedrooms are where the WPC trade-off makes sense.
Floating or glued down
Floating is faster, cheaper and removable, and it moves as one large sheet, so it needs an honest expansion gap at every wall and column. Glue-down pins each plank, which eliminates gapping and peaking and handles rolling loads and long uninterrupted runs. If the floor is crossing several thousand square feet with no transitions, or sitting under a wall of west-facing glass, glue-down stops being optional.
Waterproof plank, not a waterproof room
Treat LVP as a surface that survives a spill, not a system that protects the structure. Silicone at the tub base, a pan under the washer, braided steel supply lines and a shutoff you can actually reach do more for the outcome of a wet event than the plank spec ever will. One real advantage over glued or nailed goods: if water does get under a floating floor, the planks can often be lifted, dried and reinstalled.
Practical considerations
Sun load and thermal movement
Rigid cores expand when they get hot. A floating floor behind west-facing glass, in a sunroom, or in the path of a sliding door can pick up enough heat to push against a tight perimeter and peak at the seams. Keep the expansion gap at the manufacturer’s stated number, break long runs at transitions, and use blinds or solar film on the worst exposure — or glue that room down instead.
Floodplain math counts the whole project
If the home sits in a mapped floodplain, improvement cost gets measured against the structure’s pre-improvement market value. At 50 percent or more, the entire structure has to be brought into floodplain compliance, which can mean elevation rather than just new flooring. Re-flooring by itself rarely reaches that line, but it stacks with the drywall, cabinets and mechanical work that usually ride along. Only the floodplain administrator for your address gives a binding determination.
Going over existing tile
Often the right call: no demolition, no dumpster, no dust. The conditions are that the tile is well bonded with no drummy spots, the grout joints are narrow enough not to telegraph through, and the added height still clears door swings, the dishwasher opening and the toe-kick under the range. Wide or deep grout lines get skim-filled first, which is still cheaper and faster than tearing the tile out.
What actually damages it
Not water — grit, heat and rubber. Sand dragged in from a yard grinds the wear layer down in traffic lanes, unpadded furniture legs dent a foamed core, and rubber-backed mats or dolly tires can leave a permanent stain where plasticizers migrate into the vinyl. Use felt pads, choose rugs with a non-staining backing, and lay plywood down before rolling an appliance across a new floor.
At a glance
| Wear layer | Where it fits | What it changes |
|---|---|---|
| 6 mil | Light-use bedrooms, quick rental turnovers | Print scuffs through in traffic lanes first |
| 12 mil | Ordinary bedrooms and living areas | Reasonable for a household without large dogs |
| 20 mil | Entries, kitchens, whole-house with pets | The usual pick when one floor runs everywhere |
| 28 mil and up | Home offices with chair casters, light commercial | Longest surface warranty, highest cost per square foot |
| Any wear layer, glued down | Direct sun and very large open runs | Removes thermal gapping; harder to take up later |
Common questions
Is LVP actually waterproof if the house takes water?
The plank is. The floor is not. Vinyl won’t swell, stain or come apart from sitting in water, which is exactly why it dominates rebuilds here. But a floating floor has seams, water runs through them, and it spreads across a slab where it can’t dry. If the water was clean and caught fast, planks can be unclicked, dried and put back down. If it stood for days, or came from a sewer backup or a flood, the floor comes up so the slab, baseboards and wall cavity can be dried and treated. Judge the event, not the label.
Why are my planks separating or lifting at the seams?
Three usual causes. The expansion gap was too tight, or it got pinned by a heavy island, a screwed-down transition or a nailed baseboard, so the floor had nowhere to go when it warmed. The slab was not flat, so the locking edge flexed until it worked loose. Or the room bakes in afternoon sun and the core expanded past what the perimeter allowed. Repairs range from opening the gap at the walls and reworking a transition to grinding a high spot and relaying a section. It rarely means replacing the material.
How thick should the plank be?
Thickness is a weak proxy for quality. Most residential rigid-core plank runs 4 to 8 millimeters, often with an attached pad, and going thicker mainly buys a little sound deadening and a little forgiveness over an imperfect slab. The specs that actually matter are the wear layer in mils, the core type, and whether the locking system is a named system with a real warranty behind it. A 5-millimeter SPC with a 20-mil wear layer will outlast an 8-millimeter board with 6 mil under the same feet.
LVP or engineered wood?
Real wood still reads as the premium surface to most buyers, and a thick engineered floor can be sanded and refinished for the next owner. LVP can’t be refinished; a damaged plank is replaced, not repaired. Where LVP wins is anywhere water is plausible — ground-floor living space, kitchens, laundry rooms, a home that has taken water before — and in getting one consistent floor through a whole house at a lower cost. Plenty of homes here do both: wood in the formal rooms, LVP wherever the risk sits.
Do the baseboards have to come off?
Not necessarily, and there are two clean approaches. Pull the base, install to the wall with the full expansion gap, then reset the base over the gap. That is the tidiest result and it lets you repaint or upsize the trim while the room is empty. Or leave the base in place and cover the gap with quarter round or shoe molding, which is faster and cheaper but adds a visible line at the bottom of the wall. Door casings get undercut either way so plank slides underneath instead of being scribed around. To have the slab checked for flatness first, call (832) 513-5639.
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