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Investment floors

Home - Post - Investment floors

Real Wood floors are an investment in your home. They will last as long as your house and compared to engineered and laminate floors they are the clear choice.  Single-use floor covers are an investment in your local floor covers and carpet store, but not your home.

The goal of an investment is much different than that of a product; an investment is a durable good. Does anyone remember the phrase planned obsolescence? To refresh your memory, it is by definition; “a policy of producing consumer goods that rapidly become obsolete.  Frequent changes in design (names), a lack of replacement materials and the use of non durable materials are characteristics of products design to fail.

Hand finished inspiration for finish to order "tank"
04 Oct

Investment floors

Customer Bill of Rights

The trust about Investment floors

LVT, engineered and all floor covers are man made and end up in landfills one day. Our floors are solid wood; engineered by Mother nature and designed to outlive the house. Real wood flooring, i.e. 3/4 or more solid, can be re-invented several times.  Real wood, not engineered floors increases the value of your home. In the market today, misinformation and single use floor coverings are praised as “better than real wood” for a number of reasons all of which 100% untrue. So we cut through the nonsense and our customers like that about us, for sure.

What is an investment floor?

Is flooring an investment or a product? A product is designed to be used for a period of time, i.e. LVT and laminate.  An investment floor, while it may fulfill the same purpose as the product such as walking on the floor, it is not designed to fail one day. An investment floor provides a return as well as a function, i.e. increased home value. Real wood floors are an investment, single use floor covers are just a lease. Yes a lease, you are paying to use a product that will have no residual value. On the other hand, a real wood floor will last forever, saving you money every seven years or a dividend of sorts, like a bond or preferred stock.

Single use floor covers such as laminate and lvt

Laminate = landfills

Future landfill

One house, One Floor mandates no person should ever have to buy laminate or engineered floor covers because they have no local real wood options. 4,000,000,000 lbs of landfill materials is produced every year in the United States with somewhere between 200,000,000 and 250,0000,000 lbs of it singe use floor coverings, including carpet.  Laminate and (more every year) engineered flooring, will be close to 30% of this by 2025. We consider this not only an environmental issue, but also the greatest wealth re-allocation from so many to so few in the history of the modern economy.

Investment (no kidding) Flooring

Green & Eco-friendly, and using any other terminology indicating ‘good for the earth’ cannot be used in the same comparison with solid real wood. Unfortunately, our site is one of very few that will tell you the truth because it is not profitable for those marketing flooring. Not profitable with regards to repeat business, ease of installation and so many other factors all designed to rob your home equity, from someone if not you. 

What are floor covers? 

Any floor created to be replaced and or not salvaged is a cover, not a floor.  LVT, laminate and engineered wood with very few exceptions are all the new carpet, i.e. they are manufactured with ‘planned obsolesce’. Real wood floors, as in 3/4 solid will be the last thing of value left in your home and salvaged one day, imagine them becoming an accent wall and lasting anothere 100 years or so. 

One House One Floor

Southern Yellow Pine Direct welcomes all of you homeowners told solid wood is too expensive or cannot be glued down. Welcome to a place where logic still exist, we tell the truth. For example, warranties,worthless, and engineered floors cannot be refinished. It all comes down to this, real wood takes time and since time is money, most floor covering companies choose to sell single use floor coverings because every seven years they get repeat business.  Our “one house one floor” promise is not popular with most contractors especially if they sell covers such as carpet, engineered floors, vinyl or laminate.

Engineered to fail

Does anyone remember the phrase planned obsolescence? To refresh your memory, it is by definition; “a policy of producing consumer goods that rapidly become obsolete.  This is done by frequent changes in design, termination of the supply of spare parts, and the use of non-durable materials.” In an update (2023) of sorts, we do an amazing source for 3/4 solid engineered Walnut, unfinished with a 6mm wear layer. And yes, it can be refinished and you finish it the first time, which we advise since it cost so much. 

Laminate is the new carpet

Laminate and LVT are the new carpet for the industry. And like carpet, these fake floors allow retail shops to keep a steady supply of repeat business. With floor covers such as engineered and laminate; you are really just leasing the floors. The question of engineered or real wood floors is easy to answer. Real wood will be the last thing of value salvaged from your home one day. Whereas, every single piece of engineered flooring will end up in a landfill. In fact, laminate is huge problem, as it remains in landfills for up to 1000 years

Carpet & now Lamiante

Number of landfills in the united states
IN A HURRY- TEXT much faster 601 826 1296
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Southern Yellow Pine Direct offer homeowners the reliability of an A+ rated BBB company; the best quality, pricing and service bar none. We operate under an "old school" philosophy that the customer is always right. We make sure you are just that by educating and dispelling myths about Southern Pine and Heart Pine flooring.
Remember we are a mill to order manufacturer of unfinished and prefinished Southern Pine, including our speciality Heart Pine. Our lead times are normally about two weeks, with Hardwoods and Imports the lead times vary and that is an understatement. 2 days -2 months has bee the answer since COVID. But things are imporving, as White Oak prices continue to fall. (Jason Howard 9/9/2022)
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Rustic does not always have knots and vice versa
19 Jul

Laminate is not wood

Misconceptions, Misdirections and Misinformation

Laminate is not wood, nor is it a floor, it is a floor cover made of chemicals and composites. Imagine a photocopy of real wood chemically bound to particle board or cheap composites. Made with synthetic materials or very thinly sliced pieces of wood, laminate equals replica. Made to look like wood grain by using a method similar to printing a photo, i.e., designed to fool those not paying attention.

Laminate is not wood- what is it?

So, in simplest terms, you print a layer of wood-colored plastic and then adhere it to a composite wood substrate like particle board.

Landfills are full of laminate and engineered floors

Laminate = landfills

As we will discuss later in our post, the variety of substrates used differ widely in quality and components. Chinese laminate manufacturers use a wide range of materials including dangerous chemicals. First, China leads the world in carbon pollution by a large and growing margin. Second, it has virtually no regulations regarding products imported and shipped back the United States.

What is in it?

The chemicals used in manufacturing laminate are dangerous and they are the fastest growing component of our landfills. ’s difficult to quantify what chemicals, will leach from laminates once they hit the landfill. Not to mention the emissions from incineration.  To put it simply, this stuff doesn’t decompose, because of all the chemicals and glues, the material never breaks down organically.

Laminate is not wood imported it is re-imported

Laminated wood is a rimport, a re-imported bi product of our timber. We ship our trees to China only to bring it back home full of toxic chemicals. We send them solid wood, which requires no toxic chemicals to produce, and in return we get plastic ‘wood like’ composite garbage. Today upwards of 10% of Americans have laminate flooring or some type of vinyl.  Every bit of it will end up in landfills poisoning the groundwater and damaging the air quality.

Laminate is not wood nor is it a floor- it is a floor cover

Laminate and Engineered floor covers are filling our landfills. Over the next 4-5 years, deposits into landfills will double from current levels of 300,000,000 lb. per year. Laminate & Engineered, add in LVT too, are a leased floor covers which rot forever on public lands? LVT, laminate and engineered floors are not green, they are not even biodegradable. Environmentalist scream about deforestation, but what is “greener” than One House, One Floor.

 

 

Have your floors reclaimed instead of landfilled

If we put the entire carbon footprint of Southern Pine flooring into the carbon footprint single use floor covers, and their chemicals products it would be like putting a BB into a boxcar.

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Southern yellow pine being refinished oil based
12 Jun

Refinishing Pine Floors

Finish and Install

Refinishing pine floors is restoring

Want an example of refinishing Pine floors? They are everywhere, flooring well over a hundred years old, some much older, being turned into the showpiece of a restoration. North and South, Southern yellow pine floors were the standard for centuries because it is both durable and beautiful. White Oak and others, all newcomers.

Rustic, Classic and Modern

Pine floors truly fit within any style, from modern to rustic. If you need examples of the durability of Southern Pine, look no further than the Antique Reclaimed pine market. Many times durability gets confused with pine being a “softwood”, while true you should understand two important additions to that statement. First, not all Southern Pine is the same, not even close. Second, the character of Southern Pine allows for easy blending of even the worst scratches, simply by hiding them. 

Refinishing pine floors allows the owners to upgrade from Southern Pine to Antique Reclaimed Pine without buying anything at all or tearing anything out for that matter. An example we offer folks goes like this; One owner buys LVT the owner Southern Pine, in ten years one has an asset worth $30,000, what does the other one has? Another floor cover, whatever the hottest new trend may be in ten years and the privilege of paying to have the old one torn out. Now most homeowners go on oblivious to what they have given up when they buy that first floor, not you because now you know the truth. Real wood is the only choice. So refinishing pine should never be option number two, do not even consider doing anything else until you see what is under the finish.

Finish the refinish 

Finishing is part of refinishing, get it. Of course you do, we want to simplify this process that some advice givers make confusing. Relax, the hard part is over as the “re” part of refinish seems to cause the most difficulty for some. Anyone can finish a floor, but not everyone can make your floor look its absolute best. Maximize the value of your investment by creating a showpiece for your home.

Choose finish type with desired characteristics

Is it easy to maintain? What about chemical or VOC’s? Clear or tinted? The number of choices outside of Home Depot can be a little intimidating. Start with your goals, protection from dogs? Does that mean protection like a bar top or easy to fix? The plot thickens, right? Our company finishes Southern Yellow Pine using Monocoat, Bona and Tung Oil finishes all of which create wonderful floors but they are very different. For a discussion on finish the finishers comfort zone or style should play big part in decision. If your local professionals have track record with a certain finish type which fits your goals, perfect. We are here to help and walk you through the entire process customized to your project.  If you are ready, contact me today and we can get started. If not keep researching your floor, it is an investment, keep that in mind!

Refinish & Reclaim

Refinishing sanding heart pine unfinished wide plank caribbean heart pine
Caribbean Heart Pine

Preparation for Refinishing

Preparation for the room is an essential part of refinishing pine. We suggest one room at a time, tape it off to control the dust, you will be glad you did.  Refinishing any type of floor is messy and you don’t want the dust and debris to end up all over your home. Face nailed flooring, the look of antique pine. Countersink any nails that have worked their way up to keep them from damaging the sander, logical. Maybe the most important, clean the floors. You must remove as much of the dirt and debris as possible before sanding. (Tremont Nail Company, if you are interested)

Refinishing pine floors requires removing the old one

You need a floor sander, buffer and the finish of your choice; the “sander” can be machine or human”. This is one area that we urge clients to use someone with experience, it might be a friend or relative but do not practice with your floor. However, do not search for installation professionals, you need a specialist. Confused? Yup, it gets that way now that everyone wants us to buy floor covers, we call them leases. If you are a DIY; depending on the floor you will need several different grades of sandpaper to reach the smooth surface desired. Practice in closet, best advice we can provide along with give us a call to see if SYP Direct has a local professional. 

Step One

Choosing the right professional for this project starts with the requirement they refinish not replace. Remember your floor refinished properly can become the showpiece (again) of the house, or it might be torn out for laminate. This is not a decision to take lightly, hold your ground and get a second opinion.  So where do you search for a true refinish specialist? If you search Google you get so many results, what about Angie’s List? 

Buying real wood flooring online can lead you to Angie’s list for an installation professional. Remember, Angie get her money, i.e. the customers are contractors or brands who advertise. Who will tell you the truth about pine and real wood floors in general? SYP Direct presents the A List, a resource without agenda. The amount of misinformation passed off as a “resource” designed to help you find your floor, by our totals, about 95% of it.

 

1st step to an amazing floor
Please send us an email. If you need a call back, ask us and guess what? We actually call you back and handle your questions, one by one.
IN A HURRY- TEXT much faster 601 826 1296
Text us now 601 826 1296
Southern Yellow Pine Direct offer homeowners the reliability of an A+ rated BBB company; the best quality, pricing and service bar none. We operate under an "old school" philosophy that the customer is always right. We make sure you are just that by educating and dispelling myths about Southern Pine and Heart Pine flooring.
Remember we are a mill to order manufacturer of unfinished and prefinished Southern Pine, including our speciality Heart Pine. Our lead times are normally about two weeks, with Hardwoods and Imports the lead times vary and that is an understatement. 2 days -2 months has bee the answer since COVID. But things are imporving, as White Oak prices continue to fall. (Jason Howard 9/9/2022)
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20 Mar

One house one floor

Customer Bill of Rights

One House should have one floor

Real wood, solid 3/4 flooring sits at the core of Southern Yellow Pine Directs  ‘One House One Floor’ philosophy. No repeat customers unless you move or add. How? Simple, we do not lease you a floor cover we sell you a floor. Refinish and create a new one every ten years rather than leasing another future landfill cover .

If it is only one floor, it has to be real. 

Our philosophy, One House, One Floor has at its core one absolute; there is never a reason to buy engineered floors unless you are a prison, state university or hospital. Second, laminate and vinyl are future ground poison unless you have tested all the myriad of chemicals used during production.

The solution involves battling a very powerful lobby, an industry literally dependent on these products and installers who cannot nail down real wood.  However, remember Mr. Adam Smith? “Vote with your wallets”  and decide the winner in free markets, it is the only answer. As consumers, we must demand One house, One Floor! No more repeat business. Imagine what we can do with that $10,000 we save every 7 years! Stop giving away our equity, retrain the public from a grass roots approach.

Beams - we use every piece except the nails

Antique reclaimed pine from decking eom

The economics of repeat business

Economics 101 under Dr. Don Diffine, great teacher, he would “argue” you to the right answer. His dry sense of humor and willingness to argue kept my attention. In this setting came my introduction to Adam Smith and the “the invisible hand” operating withing markets. The invisible hand tells us that money will follow the path of least resistance, i.e. it has no conscience. Flash to present day and you can find a salesperson who will tell you to “tear out real wood” to put in LVT In the decade that gave us Wall Street and “greed is good”, Adam Smith helped me understand what this meant.

When did one house one floor stop being a thing?

In 1992 Ross Perot warned of a “giant sucking sound” of jobs leaving. We can argue that point, but we certainly saw a giant sucking of American wealth. Cheap products, planned obsolescence on steroids with the mantra, “ it is just cheaper to buy a new one.” Real wood floors disappeared, along with “one house one floor” and the Maytag man. Now before you think we are pining (pun intended) for the past, not even close. Investment flooring, our promise, has at the core a very simple premise, One House One Floor. In the real world that means our floors will outlive the house, reclaimed and sold again for 10 times the price, i.e. an investment.

One house one floor, no kidding

Financial Crisis, only slower

Remember the last big transfer of homeowner equity? The financial crisis stripped homeowners of any equity, leaving many upsides down for good. The Flooring industry is more subtle, slowing robbing the equity on leased floors every 5-7 years. OK, can we assume, every we replace covers every 7 years? Too frequent? Make it every 10 years- or 14 times if the home reaches 140 years. How much does it cost to tear out the last one to put in the next leased cover, is $10,000 fair? More than, right? 14 x 10,000 is $140,000 for this house, what about the subdivision, the city, the state and nation? Do the math, you will need a special calculator for large numbers before you leave the subdivision. Please, One House One Floor.

Reclaim one day

#1 grade antique reclaimed heart pine

Unlimited uses

Antique heart pine used for bathroom counter

Real is better than fake

Installing a real wood floor begins with pre conditioning
Read More
Real wood flooring last forever
05 Dec

Real Wood Floors

Customer Bill of Rights, Misconceptions, Misdirections and Misinformation, Wood Floor Shopping

Understanding Solid Wood Floors

Before you shop and buy real wood floors, you should understand them. Before you install them, understanding solid wood floors is key. Please do not take offense to the insinuation you should understand solid wood floors. In fact, we you are referring to our specialty, pine the lack of knowledge among installers is shocking. Solid wood flooring site finish and installation is an art, a lost one for that matter. Not long-ago artisans and craftsmen took pride in sanding, finishing and repeating! Today time is money and real wood takes time.

Buying solid wood usually means a site finish

Site finished pine flooring needs preparation. Preparing for the wood is an important step often overlooked, the preconditioning portion of the finish. When you have unfinished solid wood floors with character, i.e. knots, different grain patterns and variance in density you need a product that prevents splotchy finishes. It is not expensive, but vital. Min-wax, for example has an excellent product.

Sanding unfinished solid wood floors

“Do you have to sand prior to finish?” The short answer is no, but we always add, only if you want your floors to look their best. Sanding your unfinished floor prior to preconditioning allows for deeper penetration and better protection not to mention it raises the grain allowing the colors to pop free. Commonly known as popping the grain and accomplished by simply running a wet rag down the board as you pull them out of the pallet crate.

Mill to order makes install easy

Milled to order is not a marketing term for us, we do not mill inventory to sit on shelves and one day match with another inventory. By milling your floors all together, on the same day from the same “trees” provides a consistent floor which goes together as it should. SYP Direct mills Alabama Longleaf Pine lumber into unfinished Knotty and Heart Pine flooring. We mill to order, for homeowners and builders, furthermore with no minimum order. We can customize your order in ways that save you time and money. Grades, widths, length (s) are just three of the ways our mill to order model benefits our customers. There is no other SYP Direct, we say yes to solid wood, every single time.

Stop leasing temporary floor covers

NullLeased flooring all has the same residual value, it cost you and the environment money, every single time. Our philosophy, One House, One Floor has at its core one absolute; there is never a reason to buy engineered floors unless you are a prison, state university or hospital. Real is better than fake, real wood is green and yes, the answer is yes you can glue down solid wood.  Southern Yellow Pine Direct welcomes all of you homeowners told solid wood is too expensive or cannot be glued down. Welcome to a place where logic still exist, we tell the truth. For example, LVT is not waterproof, warranties are worthless, you can glue down solid wood and real wood is certainly more durable than single use leased covers.

Advertising by box stores

Today a Google search for the best solid wood pine floors sends you Clover Lea pine wood floors, LL Flooring formerly lumber liquidators.  These are the exact opposite of quality for a number of reasons.  Buyers many times have no clue the difference in quality, it is substantial to say the least.

Angie’s List wrong on flooring

Real wood floors

Buying real wood flooring online can lead you to Angie’s list for an installation professional. Remember, Angie get her money, i.e. the customers are contractors or brands who advertise. Who will tell you the truth about pine and real wood floors in general? SYP Direct presents the A List; a resource without agenda. The amount of misinformation passed off as a “resource” designed to help you find your floor, by our totals, about 95% of it.

Free Markets are good when fair

We are not anti-free markets, not at all. However, under a cloud of propaganda we believe, with zero doubt that homeowners are getting ripped off. A Google search, finding real wood floors, provides Angie’s List as a top result. Not to strange, since they do have hardwood flooring companies on their site (s). However,  further inspection, Angie’s seems to be repeating the same nonsense as the box stores and your local installer trying to sell you “their” floors.  

Buying Real Wood Flooring

Buying real wood flooring online can be aggravating, almost as bad as going into a box store. So how do you find and buy real pine floors online? The age and species are a perfect place to start. Determining the age of pine should determine the price of flooring, not lumber but the ‘stuff we walk on’. Age creates stability, stability and character not to mentions the colors we all love. Patina is a word directly associated with age and light exposure, with older wood the patina is deep and rich; i.e more expensive.

Investment Approach to Flooring

Antqiue reclaimed heart pine wall wood siding only comes from using real woodSo you want to buy real wood floors, solid not LVT or laminate, a floor not a floor cover.   Very few sources of information will provide the truth from the homeowner perspective. Compare heart pine wood floors to a single use floor such as laminate or engineered wood, one last forever the other is just a lease. Single-use floor covers provide returns for the seller, not the homeowner. A single use floor is designed to wear out as it is a product; an investment is a durable good. Does anyone remember the phrase planned obsolescence? To refresh your memory, it is by definition; “a policy of producing consumer goods that rapidly become obsolete.  Frequent changes in design, termination of spare parts, and the use of non-durable materials make it impossible to match a damaged floor.

Invest in Solid Wood Floors

What is investment flooring? Is flooring an investment or a product? A product is designed to be used for a period of time. An investment, while it may fulfill the same purpose as the product such as walking on the floor, it is not designed to fail one day. An investment floor provides a return as well as a function, i.e., increased home value. Real wood floors are an investment, single use floor covers are just a lease. Yes, a lease, you are paying to use a product that will have no residual value. On the other hand, a real wood floor will last forever, saving you money every seven years or a dividend of sorts, like a bond or preferred stock.

IN A HURRY- TEXT much faster 601 826 1296
Text us now 601 826 1296
Southern Yellow Pine Direct offer homeowners the reliability of an A+ rated BBB company; the best quality, pricing and service bar none. We operate under an "old school" philosophy that the customer is always right. We make sure you are just that by educating and dispelling myths about Southern Pine and Heart Pine flooring.
Remember we are a mill to order manufacturer of unfinished and prefinished Southern Pine, including our speciality Heart Pine. Our lead times are normally about two weeks, with Hardwoods and Imports the lead times vary and that is an understatement. 2 days -2 months has bee the answer since COVID. But things are imporving, as White Oak prices continue to fall. (Jason Howard 9/9/2022)
Read More
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