I’ll just ignore all the other issues (Rachel Maddow covers them beautifully in her segment below), and I’ll answer the question posed by Mr. Skelton…

7 years old is the perfect age to discuss what it means to be gay with your kids. Why? Because at that age it’s not about sex - it’s about the relationship. You don’t have to discuss what you might think of as “icky” sexual practices - you can talk about loving relationships which should never be seen as “icky”. If your 7 year old asks if gay couples have kids, explain adoption to them and say gay couples adopt kids that same-sex couples aren’t able to care for. There’s nothing icky in that either…

I can see where the question could be awkward if the kid is 12 or 13, but I don’t see anything awkward about answering the question when the kid is 7.

And now for Rachel Maddow’s take on the issue…

The first thing that was rejected was the energy review. Our architect did this complex analysis using a web-based program provided by the federal government where you enter all the characteristics of the building including wall types, window types, light fixtures, etc. and it confirms compliance with the 2010 standards that are in effect for New York State. But the plan examiner rejected it because NYC is still on 2007 energy standards and the 2010 standards aren’t being phased in until later this year. They literally told us to come back in 24 days, on July 1, since they’ll accept our architect’s energy analysis on that date. So we got rejected for showing compliance with a more demanding standard that they’re going to use in less than a month. Go figure.

Second major item was the sprinkler system (again). This time the plan examiner wanted documentation that there was sufficient pressure in the water main to support the sprinklers being on the domestic water supply despite the fact that the code specifically states that sprinkler systems with 30 or fewer heads can feed off the domestic water supply. He also wanted all the pipe sizes and sprinkler heads specified, but that’s typically done when the sprinkler system is certified - it doesn’t need to be done at this point and requiring it now is just being difficult.

The biggest issue that he raised is that he’s insisting we do a pressure test on the water main to do the calculations to determine the sizes of pipes that are required for the sprinkler system. It takes 4 to 6 weeks to get DEP to do a flow test, so that means we can’t go in for a plan review until that’s done. Again, the flow test is typically done after DOB approves the overall plan - he’s just being obstructionist IMHO.

At one point the plan examiner insisted that we needed 2 hour fire rated walls around the stairwell, not 1 hour walls. Our expediter stuck to his guns and then it took the plan examiner 10 minutes of searching the code to realize we were right and he was wrong. Why do they have people doing plan exams who don’t know the code? If the code is just horribly complicated then why not have plan examiners specialize in certain building types? If we had someone who really knew the code issues for townhouses then maybe they’d know the code well enough to do their job properly.

Then the plan examiner was telling our expediter that he saw errors in the “I-Cards” for the building. I-Cards were the predecessor to Certificates of Occupancy, which came out in 1938. So in other words, he was holding us responsible for errors previous building owners made dating back to 1938 or before. I mean please… The whole point of our rehabbing the building is to bring it up to code and get a C of O. How can inaccuracies on the old I-Cards matter when the point of the exercise is to make them obsolete by getting a C of O?

Next time Dan and I will go to the plan review to prove the point that we’re not some nefarious slumlord trying to build a crappy substandard building. We’re just regular guys. Plus, with the enormous workload that DOB is under right now I just don’t understand how it’s productive for them to keep having us come back over and over again for stupid little things.

Now imagine if we were trying to purchase the place with a rehab loan and needed to get approved plans to close the loan. Obstructions like this can really hamper redevelopment of blighted buildings - for no good reason because they can tank deals. And it’s the reason why it can take FOREVER to close when the buyer needs financing to purchase. I’m sure more than a few deals have gone bad because DOB took too long and the contracts expired.

After listening to the intro, skip the discussion of the oil spill by clicking in the area to the right of the pause button and jump to time code 7:23 in the video…

Some of the best lines were Matthew Dowd saying “Republican office holders are so far out of step on this”, “it’s way overdue” (his emphasis). And then George Will saying that for young people “being gay is like being left handed - it’s not really very interesting”. And then he quotes a Supreme Court decision that talks about “the evolving standards of decency that mark a maturing society”. I wonder if he realizes just how damning that phrase is of people who favor “traditional values”. It literally says they’re neither mature nor decent. Then he goes on to say “the case is over” and the Republicans in Congress are “not being very intelligent”.

First there was Laura Bush, now Matthew Dowd and George Will… It’s really refreshing to see Republicans standing up for what’s right. But what took them so long? Democrats figured this out decades ago…

Last year I thought the comp for it was it’s sister townhouse around the corner - 883 St. Nicholas Ave which sold in July ‘09 for $1.04M. Thing was, 883 was recently renovated and in better condition, so we figured 413 would go for less than that - probably under $1M.

Aging bathroom needs renovation

413 West 154 had had a day care center in the ground floor which was an English basement, so not completely livable space. The English basement was a bit of an issue for us since Dan wouldn’t have had a cellar to use for an art studio and we didn’t really have the option of a rental apartment on the ground floor unless it was a studio apartment. Despite being it being 21 feet wide, the rooms weren’t that wide because there was a structural wall running the length of the building. The top floor was a one bedroom “mother-in-law’s apartment” - so not legally rentable, but still an independent unit with it’s own kitchen, etc.

The other negatives were that it was a 1/2 block from a large housing project, and while it’s literally “around the corner” from the subway it’s just the C train - and it’s a long walk to express trains.

What 413 West 154 had going for it was that it was incredibly solidly built and completely livable. It looked like it had been renovated in the 80s and everything seemed like it was in working order, though the renovations were looking dated and needed a lot of updating. We knew if we moved into it that we’d want to spend $200-250K on bathroom and kitchen renovations. We never bid on it - there was just too big of a discrepancy between what they were asking and what it was worth to us and the layout didn’t really meet our needs.

Here are some pictures to give you an idea what it was like…

Basement level looking out to garden (previously the day care center)

Living room with spiral staircase up to master bedroom

Back yard with basketball hoop

Back wall showing building was in great condition

So, if you’re in the market for a townhouse, realize prices are starting to go back up. You’ll need to bid higher than you would have a 6 months to a year ago. That’s good news if you’re trying to sell or if you just bought. We’re not talking a huge jump in prices, but enough to be noticeable.

As I was writing up this post I got a call that our plans were not approved (for the 2nd time) and the issues were largely due to changes in the 2008 code. (Today is definitely a day when it feels like we’re ‘beating upwind’…)

Sprinklers

Possibly the biggest change in terms of expense is that most townhouses now require a full sprinkler system. Apparently the new code conflicts itself - part of it says 1 and 2 family homes require sprinklers, another part says they can be exempt. At one point I found the FDNY’s ruling that said that if the townhouse was being restored back to it’s original 1 or 2 family use then sprinklers were not required at all. However, once a DOB plan examiner says they want sprinklers (as in our case) there’s no way FDNY is going to overrule them and say they’re not necessary. Here are the part of the code that were cited by our plan examiner:

903.2.7 Group R. An automatic sprinkler system shall be installed in Group R fire areas. An automatic sprinkler system shall be installed throughout buildings with a main use or dominant occupancy of Group R.

Exception: An automatic sprinkler system shall not be required in detached one- and two-family dwellings and multiple single-family dwellings (town houses), provided that such structures are not more than three stories above grade plane in height and have separate means of egress.

Here’s a summary of the code in graphical format…

(Source)

So we’re now stuck having to put in a sprinkler system. I’m not sure why, but our architect and his expediter were reading the code only the egress had to be sprinklered so he drew up sprinklers on every stair landing and between the stairs and the front door using “water walls” between the stairs/corridor and the kitchen and the living room. But as I was writing this I got a call saying the plan examiner wants the entire building sprinklered (which is consistent with the part of the code he cited). That could be cost prohibitive for us - so it’s potentially very bad news…

The reason why any sprinkler system is so expensive is because sprinklers have to plumbed with cast iron pipe. Copper melts in a fire. The problem is our connection to the water main may not be big enough to support the demand put on it by the sprinklers. So that means we may have to upgrade our connection to the water main or get a dedicated connection to the main for the sprinkler system. That’s major money because it requires tearing up the sidewalk and touching the water main for the street.

We need to get estimates, but the sprinkler system the DOB plan examiner wants will cost WELL over $100K. Now we have to figure out what can be cut so we can afford the sprinkler system. So we’ve hit a pretty major roadblock.

Smoke Detectors

A more minor point is that all smoke detectors in the building now have to be interconnected - so if one goes off they all go off (great fun when what you’re looking gets a bit smokey).

Egress Stairs

Another change is that the 2008 code now requires that the stairwell continue up to the roof. Typically the way townhouses were built was to have a hatch going up to the roof. Now you need a bulkhead with  a full 3′ wide staircase and a door.

27-375(i) (1)(b) - “Buildings exceeding three stories in height shall be provided with one stairway at least three feet in width enclosed in fire-retarding partitions with a fire resistive rating of one hour protected by FPSC doors leading directly to the street and to the roof bulkhead.”

That’s less of an expense than a sprinkler system, but if you’ve got original staircases the question is how to match the style of the current stairs on the staircase going up to the roof. And what happens if you’re staircases aren’t a full 3′ wide? That could be a bit costly - or you’ll have a different type of staircase going the last flight.

There is one good thing about requiring bulkheads - if you put south facing windows in the bulkhead it’s better than having a skylight. The problem with skylights is that they don’t capture much of the low winter light (when you want as much light and heat gain as possible) and they capture too much of the high summer sun - making the building hot and increasing your air conditioning bills. Bulkhead windows get the maximum amount of winter sun and heat (lowering your heating bills) and capture less sun and heat in the summer (lowering your air conditioning bills).

Energy Considerations

Another frustration that relates to the 2008 code is that the plan examiner wants a crazy amount of detail on the energy usage of the building. The code is pretty clear that there are multiple ways to prove energy efficiency. Our architect did one of those ways (using a goverment program that calculates energy efficiency), but the plan examiner said that wasn’t good enough. He wants details on every window, exterior door, and light fixture.

If Your Buying A Townhouse…

If you’re in the process of building a townhouse that needs a lot of work (or already own one) - realize the 2008 code will impact you greatly, as it’s affecting us. The townhouses you may be seeing that are renovated were typically renovated under the old, 1968, building code. You have to meet  a much more demanding standard now.

If you can find a townhouse that has plans that were approved under the old building code then you can use those plans provided the permits have been kept current. But if the permits expired make the current get them renewed before you purchase the property. But realize you’ll be able to make minor changes to those plans. Talk to an architect and an expediter to make sure you can build under those plans. If the owner can’t get the plans renewed, lower your bid price substantially to compensate yourself for having to meet 2008 code.

If you’re buying a townhouse without approved plans (the norm) make sure you overestimate your renovation costs to compensate for things like full sprinkler systems. It can get expensive to meet 2008 code.

The latest evidence of this is Rachel Maddow’s interview last night with Rand Paul - the teabagger who just won the Republican primary for Kentucky’s Senate seat. He said in the interview that he only agrees with 9/10ths of the 1964 Civil Rights Act. The 1/10th he doesn’t agree with is the part about private businesses not being allowed to discriminate. So while he feels blacks should be able to sit in the front of the bus, he thinks it should be legal if their refused service for things like getting a meal, or getting a hotel room.

He’s also said he feels the same way about the Americans with Disabilities Act. He thinks the government should be required to put in curb cuts for wheelchairs, but doesn’t think employers should be required to provide things like elevators. In the interview below he said it’s adequate if the employer gives the handicapped person an office on the first floor.

The problem is that this type of thinking extends into current day issues like LGBT rights. He would be OK with employers not hiring gay or transgendered people or gay men showing up at a hotel and being refused a room because they’re gay.

He says it infringes on free speech to require private businesses to serve people they’re not comfortable with. I think the point is people are free to say what they want (as long as they don’t incite violence), but if they don’t want to serve everyone they shouldn’t own a service business.

She’s now my conservative hero… Can we clone her?

I wonder if she disagrees with George W on drilling in the arctic and offshore?

When I was getting my high blood pressure figured out I went to a hypertension specialist and he felt there’s a good chance I’m hypertensive because I was gay and grew up in a fundamentalist environment. Repressing who you are is not healthy, it’s not “therapy”, and it can lead to serious health problems.

So if one of the guys who started it thinks programs like Exodus are all smoke and mirrors, that sorta deflates their claims pretty effectively. Wherever it comes from, if you’re gay, you’re gay… Accept it and move on…

The other night Frontline had a program the other day on “The Dancing Boys of Afghanistan”. Afghanistan has a tradition that’s called “bacha bazi” (بچه بازی) which literally translates to “baby play”. Poor young boys are recruited by an older wealthy men, their families paid pretty well for the boys, and they’re “trained” to entertain men. Not stated in the documentary, but pretty clear from watching which boys are recruited, is the fact that they’re trying to find and recruit kids who are probably gay. It probably also explains why the families are willing to  sell the boys - I doubt they’d sell their butch, rugged son, but it’s not such a big deal to sell the kids who they suspect to be gay.

The entertainment consists of dressing them as women and having them dance for a group of men. Curiously, the dancing part is quite modest - like women dancers, hardly any skin shows.

The issue is that after the performance their “master” (owner) may lend the boy to another man for the evening and sex is expected. From a western perspective this is literally sexual slavery of minors. The other big problem is that while some of the boys manage to fit in (the femmy gay ones), ones who resist and cause problems are often killed.

What’s interesting is that it’s all practiced pretty openly. Frontline even showed one case where bacha bazi was the entertainment for men attending a wedding. And most of the men who involved are powerful, with standing in the community - military commanders, police chiefs, businessmen, etc.

When I was in college studying sociology and Middle Eastern studies one of the big challenges was to try to look at cultures from their own eyes - cultural relativism. The Afghans who are outraged about bacha bazi are typically western educated, English speakers, or strict Muslims (the Taliban banned bacha bazi). I think part of their outrage comes from that fact that rich, powerful “straight” men with families might actually be gay or bisexual. Yes, there are serious exploitation issues with bacha bazi, but I think homophobia is a big part of the opposition to it. If the boys were older and things were more consensual (like western drag queen) many of the opponents would probably still be opposed to it.

However, the traditional Afghan seems to pretty much accept bacha bazi, and in a culture that isn’t all that fond of educating women and makes women wear burqas, it’s really not that surprising. Human life just isn’t intrinsically valued in Afghanistan like it is in the west. All men are not created equal. In Afghanistan if you’re male and wealthy you get to do pretty much what you want. And if you’re poor or female your life will be dictated by others with more power. Women literally can’t show their faces in public and some poor boys are required to have sex with older wealthy men.

So ultimately this is less about a sex crime and more about principles of basic equality. You can pass all the laws you want outlawing bacha bazi (as the Taiban did), but it will have little effect if you don’t instill in people that everyone is inherently equal and that there are certain human right everyone just gets without earning them.

If you’re sitting there thinking the Afghans are so horrible for accepting bacha bazi, think again. Many in the “Tea Party” movement seem to have big problems with the fact that the country is being led by a black man and say pretty horrible things about him based solely on his skin color. Others spend millions of dollars fighting civil rights for gay people. Others don’t like to ride in airplanes with Muslims. Then there are the thousands of hate crimes that are reported every year with some people getting killed simply because of the color of their skin, or their religion or their sexual orientation. We’re really not in a position to throw stones at the Afghans.

First, a few explanations of what some of those values mean…

• “U” is “U-Factor” which measures the insulating value of the window. The lower the better.
• “SHGC” is the Solar Heat Gain Coefficient which measures how much solar rays can heat the building. It’s a proportion, so an SHGC of 0.26 means that 26% of the sun’s heat gets through the window and 74% is blocked.
• “VT” is the visible light that’s transmitted. It’s also a proportion, so a VT of 0.50 means 50% of the visible light is transmitted through the window. The higher this value, the brighter your room will be.

The problem is that they assume that you’re installing the same types of windows in all the windows in your house and that you heat and cool your house evenly. Neither of those assumptions are true for us.

In our case the windows in the back are facing south and will get an incredible amount of light. The windows in the front will only get direct sun for maybe an hour early each morning, and the windows on the side will get no sun at all. Simply put you want different windows where there’s lots of direct light than you do where there’s virtually no direct light, so those recommendations only take you so far…

The other issue is balancing the windows effect on heating and cooling. The U-value is going to determine how much the outside temperature affects the inside temperature. You want well insulated windows so on cold or hot days the temperature inside the building isn’t affected. This means you want as low of a U-factor as possible. However, with solar heat gain it gets a lot more complicated. The more solar heat gain you have, the lower your heating bills will be, but the higher your cooling bills will be.

If you’ve heard of “passive houses” the idea is that they want solar heat gain in the winter and try to avoid it in the summer. They’ll have concrete floors on the south to absorb and store solar heat in the winter, but then they’ll have overhangs that block solar heat gain as the sun climbs in the summer. Passive houses are all about being intelligent about solar heat gain.

We really don’t care about LEED certification in the least, but we do care about how much it costs to run our house. We’re going with more expensive closed cell foam insulation in the walls, and (as you can see) I’m giving a lot of thought to our window choice in an attempt to reduce the heating and cooling bills. We’re more than happy to put extra money towards stuff that will save us money down the road. So here’s my thinking…

Windows that get almost no direct light…

• U-factor is important
• SHGC is irrelevant (no direct sun means virtually no solar heat gain)
• Visible light transmission should be as high as possible

Windows that get lots of light…

• U-factor is important
• SHGC “depends”
• Visible light transmission “depends”

I don’t like to be in overly sunny rooms. I often cross the street to get out of the sun and I hate sunny places like Arizona and Southern California. So I don’t want a whole lot of visible light transmission on the southern windows. Your taste may differ - many people like direct sun - I’m just not one of them.

The SHGC you want depends on how you have your house arranged. In reading Julia Angwin’s blog on the Wall Street Journal I see she’s taking a very different tack than we are. She specifically said “We chose the south side for our office so we could have good light during the day.” (source)  She and her husband are clearly people who like direct sunlight. In my mind “good light” is indirect northern light, so I want our home office on the north side. I would hate Julia’s south-facing office, but that’s just me… In addition to light issues I want the office on the front because the street is noisy and I can tolerate more noise in the office than I can in the bedroom when I’m trying to sleep.

I say all of that for a purpose. How you arrange your house will have an impact on what SHGC value you shoot for on your southern windows. In our case our primary daytime room (the home office) will be on the north side of the building. Solar heat gain is not going to affect our air conditioning bills too much on weekdays because we’re not in sunny rooms during the day - just maybe a bit on weekends when we use more rooms in the house during peak cooling hours. On the other hand Julia Angwin is spending time during peak cooling hours in a south facing room. A low SHGC value is far more important to her than it is to us.

In addition, unlike Julia and her husband, we’ll be providing heat for our ground floor tenants. On top of that, since we’re going with a mini-split system for cooling every room will be a zone for cooling and we can just cool the room(s) we’re in. But heating will be more general. While we can turn off the rads in rooms, there’s a certain level of heat we have to maintain throughout the house.

As a result, I’m expecting heating to be a bigger expense than cooling. That means we’ll benefit by having somewhat higher SHGC values on the south facing windows… If you look at the graphic above you’ll see the two scenarios where the heating cost was below $800 had very different SHGC values - 0.40 in one case and 0.56 in the other. Lower isn’t necessarily better when it comes to SHGC. If you’re in Miami it is, but not NYC.

The other issue that’s important to us when it comes to windows is how much UV is blocked. I remember visiting my sister’s friend’s apartment when I was in college. They had an incredible place in San Francisco with water views. Problem was their windows let through too much UV and it ruined a Matisse color block collage they had bought. We’re a bit paranoid about UV affecting our art and furniture. That means that UV protection will be a huge issue for us on south facing windows (and somewhat on north facing windows).

And to make things even more complicated, I think we’ll be getting Gaulhofer windows (from Austria) and Europeans measure a lot of these values differently (especially SHGC) so I’ve been struggling to convert European values into US values. But Gaulhofers are just incredible windows - their standard window is tilt-n-turn (an inswing casement that can also open a little at the top to allow ventilation), and they’re made with furniture grade wood - not the cheap crappy pine Marvin and Andersen use.

The bottom line is there are a lot of factors you should consider when picking windows and it gets a bit confusing to balance all the different criteria. But if you give it some thought it starts to make sense…

To be specific… “The data showed 85 people were assaulted in places of worship, compared to 66 at an adult entertainment premises… Places of worship also took the lead in sexual offences (16), theft from motor vehicles (33), resisting arrest (7) and liquor offences (10). Harassment and threatening behaviour at places of worship (30) was over 50 percent more than at places of adult entertainment (13).” That’s right, there’s more sex crime in churches than in sex clubs.

None of that should be all that surprising. How many wars have been fought in the name of religion? How many millions of people have been killed in the name of religion? The Spanish Inquisition? Fatwas? On the other hand I’m having a hard time thinking of a war fought to defend “adult activities”. Hitler put gay men in the death camps - but that sorta proves my point - the person doing the “deviant act” wasn’t the one doing the killing.

The other aspect is that churches tell you there’s something wrong with you and you need to change. That means people wind up repressing their urges. The problem with Catholic pedophile priests shows what happen when you take that approach. In contrast, sex businesses accept you for who you are (for the most part) and you give a legal outlet for your urges.

If you need even more evidence check out Joe.My.God.’s “This Week In Holy Crimes” series of blog posts. It’s truly amazing how screwed up some religious leaders are.

That said, religion done right can be a good thing. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a brothel or a sex shop or a massage parlor be a community center, or do social work, or pressure politicians on behalf of their community, yet I’ve seen churches do all of those things. But all of those things are also done by non-religious community organizations. So while I wouldn’t advocate replacing churches with strip clubs, I do wonder if we wouldn’t be better off replacing them with community centers.

How would you like it if some did a study as to whether people like you should be treated with equality and respect? They’re literally going around asking service members and their families whether they have a problem with gay men and lesbians serving, as if we should care if they don’t.

What would the reaction be if we were asking people if they minded if Jews, Mormons or African Americans served in the military? It’s an absurd question on it’s face.

Yet these things do happen… I remember when I went to the University of Texas at Austin I stayed in a private dorm that was run by Jews (orthodox Jews got the lowest floors, then more mainstream Jews were on the floors above them, then there was a mixed intensive study floor, and then the top of the dorm was where the ‘goyim’ lived). When I sat down with them and they were trying to find a room for me they said “well, we have a spot on the intensive study floor, but your roommate would be Latino - do you mind that?” The question floored me. While I was brought up in an almost all white environment I had been taught race didn’t matter.

I know none of this sort of thing comes as a shock to people who are racial minorities and have faced inequality all their lives, but I still really wish I could turn the table on some of these bigots and have a study which asked people if they should be treated with dignity and respect. They seemed to have forgotten “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you”…

I know it’s just a matter of time before Don’t Ask Don’t tell is gone, but it sorta galls me that a President who’s had to deal personally with racial discrimination can’t stand up for the core principle of treating everyone equally. Taking policies like this down slowly reinforces the idea that it’s understandable to be a bigot.

And how can a military that doesn’t live by “equality and justice for all” police that concept around the world? Military conflicts just get worse when soldiers think the person they’re pointing their guns at aren’t as good as they are…

UPDATE:

Even though President Obama it crystal clear about getting rid of Don’t Ask Don’t Tell, the White House has also made it clear that they won’t get rid of it until their ’study’ is done. What is the logic in that? Either their not taking the study seriously and it’s recommendations will have no impact and they’ll do what they’re telling the LGBT community, or they are taking the study seriously and they may not get rid of Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell, in which case they’re flat out lying to the LGBT community. Pick a side - any side… Just stand for something…

To me that’s pretty remarkable… Same previous owner, same neighborhood, same square footage, yet they paid 41.5% more for their place than we paid for ours.

But the reason is pretty simple - width… 18 feet is the width when developers start getting interested in a townhouse. Building code requires a 3′ wide staircase and 3′ hallways. You’ll need one public hallway for the staircase and then another inside the apartment. Even if you do exposed brick, you’ll have at least 8″ of wall, so you need 9′ 8″ just for the required parts. In our building that leaves less than 4 feet for a bathroom, which isn’t enough. On a standard 18 footer that has about about 17 feet brick to brick you have over 7 feet of room for the bathroom, closets, etc. - which is plenty…

That means if you’re looking for a bargain on a Harlem townhouse shell and you just want it to be 2 or 3 family, then you should go narrow… You’ll get a better price on a 15 or 16 footer than you will on an 18+ footer, ’cause you won’t be competing with developers.

UPDATE: One thing I forgot to mention is that once a narrow townhouse is renovated it can sell for good money as is evidenced by the recent comp over on 119. So this really does seem to be a supply vs. demand issue. There’s just more demand for wider shells than there is for narrower shells. You pay a premium at 18+ feet because you’re competing with developers.

We want a good wood floor, but aren’t going for anything exotic. Our stair treads will be wood, so we need the same species of wood throughout the house - that would get very expensive if we went with a rare wood. That means we’re going to use oak. It’s a great material, plentiful and well priced.

White Oak vs. Red Oak

There are two primary types of oak - red oak and white oak. Dan’s been wanting white oak since it’s easier to stain any color, however red oak is a little less expensive. I was just researching the difference between the two and came across a forum thread that described how white oak has a closed pore structure and red oak has an open pore structure. That means red oak should not be used in wet conditions. (Which means when we redid our old boat’s mast step using red oak we made a pretty big mistake. The mast step sits in the bilge - so it’s frequently submerged in water. Oh well, apologies to the person who bought the boat from us!) So that makes white oak the better, more versatile choice unless you want the reddish color you get with red oak.

Solid Wood vs. Engineered Wood

One thing we did learn by visiting State of The Art Wood Flooring was that engineered wood floors don’t necessarily look like we thought they looked. Both Dan and I thought engineered floors were always glossy, but that’s not the case at all. They had engineered floors in the showroom that had these really cool finishes on them. They were a matte finish and had a little bit of texture to them. They looked like wood that had just been oiled a bit - quite beautiful actually. The texture they had on them is one that’s impossible to replicate with a solid wood floor unless you’re willing to spend big bucks. So it’s odd that the engineered floor looked more natural than solid wood… Go figure. (Of course there were plenty with a high gloss finish as well.)

Another difference between solid and engineered is that solid wood flooring needs to sit in the building for a couple weeks before installation in order to acclimate. Engineered wood doesn’t expand and contract nearly as much, so it can be put down the same day it gets to the job site.

We already knew the two were installed differently. Once engineered is down you have to be very careful about protecting it since it’s pre-finished. The flooring guy said it should go down at the very end of the project right before you do baseboards. That means the contractor we interviewed who had put it down before he’d fully closed up the walls was making a mistake. By contrast you can put solid wood floors down earlier in the process and while you have to be careful to avoid staining them, dirt won’t hurt them because they’ll be sanded during the finishing process.

For the rental unit where we may want to sand the floors every few years to freshen up the apartment, solid wood floors are best because they can be sanded many more times than an engineered floor. We’ve also decided on solid wood for our own unit because we’re going to need to match the appearance with the stair treads and matching factory finished wood could be impossible.

[By the way - don't even think about laminate flooring. It's essentially junky wood (or a plastic) with the equivalent of a wood grain wallpaper applied to it. Rarely ever a good idea...]

Flat Cut vs. Quarter Sawn vs. Rift Sawn

How you cut the boards from the tree makes a difference in the grain you get…

Flat sawn is the standard and least expensive way to make wood flooring. When you see oak floors that have a lot of wavy grain in them - they’re flat cut. On the other end of the spectrum is rift sawn flooring. Here the grain is perfectly uniform and all in nice linear lines that run the length of the board. But if you look at the diagram you can see that because it’s a radial cut, there’s a lot of wasted wood. Quarter sawn is a compromise between flat and rift. The grain is much more uniform than with flat cut, but not as perfect looking as rift sawn - you’ll get banded lines across the boards, which can actually be quite pretty. There’s not nearly as much wastage with quarter sawn as there is with rift cuts so quarter sawn is less expensive than rift.

We also learned that there’s a category called “quarter sawn or rift sawn” that’s cheaper than just quarter sawn. If you look at the diagram you’ll see there’s one large rift sawn board in every set of quarter sawn cuts. It takes time to separate that board from the others, so if you’re OK with either then you’ll pay a little less.

Quality

There are different qualities of wood. If you don’t mind knots, then you’ll save money by getting “natural grade”. However, if you want a cleaner look with no knots then you’ll want to get “select grade”.

The Price Points

For starters there’s a range of prices for both engineered and solid wood and those ranges overlap a lot. You have to first find what you like and then look at the price. Don’t go into it thinking you want an engineered floor so you can save money. You may find the solid wood floor you like is less expensive than the engineered floor you like.

With solid vs engineered you also have to factor in the cost of installation which is much lower for engineered floors. As a general rule of thumb a solid floor will cost $4.50 to $5/sq. ft. to install, so you need to add that to the cost when you compare the prices.

Cut rate prices on 3/4″ thick unfinished solid wood flooring (from Lumber Liquidators)…

• $2.89 - 4″ Red Oak, flat cut, natural grade
• $2.99 - 4″ Red Oak, flat cut, select grade
• $3.19 - 4″ White Oak, flat cut, select grade
• $3.29 - 2 1/4″ Red Oak, quarter sawn, select grade
• $3.49 - 3 1/4″ Red Oak, quarter sawn, select grade
• $3.99 - 2 1/4″ White Oak, quarter sawn, select grade

They also said that given the square footage we’re doing we could take about 20 cents off each of those prices.

State of the Art Wood Flooring had a much higher quality selection to choose from, still for a basic wood floor their prices weren’t all that different than Lumber Liquidators…

• approx $4/sq. ft. for unfinished 4″ white oak
• approx $15/sq. ft. for unfinished oak precut for a chevron pattern
• approx $13/sq. ft. for finished, engineered floor
• approx $19/sq. ft. for finished, engineered cut into a chevron pattern

Add $4.50 to $5 for finishing and you see that unfinished solid wood comes out a bit less expensive than a nice engineered floor. I’m pretty sure those prices were for flat cut, select grade, so you can see Lumber Liquidators saves you approximately 25%. Still, we’re just talking about $1/sq. ft. to go with a full-service, high-quality flooring company. I’m sorta inclined to pay the extra to get the service and quality…

What We’re Budgeting

• Rental (cellar level) - TBD
• The rental unit (ground floor) - 3 1/4″ white oak, flat cut, natural grade - $8.50/sq. ft.
• Parlor floor (areas with chevron pattern) - 2 1/4″ white oak, quarter or rift sawn, select grade - $20/sq. ft.
• Parlor floor (areas with straight boards) - 3 1/4″ white oak, quarter or rift sawn, select grade - $10.50/sq. ft.
• 2nd floor (master bedroom, etc.) - 4″ white oak, quarter or rift sawn, select grade - $10.50/sq. ft.
• 3rd floor (office, guest bedroom) - 3 1/4″ white oak, flat cut, select grade - $9.00/sq. ft.
• 4th floor (stair hallway) - 3 1/4″ white oak, flat cut, select grade - $9.00/sq. ft.
• 4th floor (Dan’s art studio) - commercial grade vinyl flooring TBD

So basically $10/sq. ft. or double that where there’s a pattern.