Wood floor repair, including water damage

We repair hardwood and parquet floors in apartments and houses across all five boroughs. We take out the damaged boards, weave new wood into the old so the joints stay staggered, and blend the repair so it is hard to find. The same work fixes gaps, squeaks, split boards, pet damage and the dark stains that build up around radiators.

1. Stop the water and tell the building. In an apartment, let the managing agent or superintendent know straight away, because the source may be in another unit or in the pipes behind the wall.
2. Get the floor dry. Mop up standing water and move rugs and furniture off the wet area. Fans help. Wood that stays wet can grow mold and keeps swelling.
3. Take photos. Photograph the damage and the source before anything is removed. You may need them for your insurer and for the building.
4. Let the wood dry out before any repair. Boards that look cupped the day after a leak can flatten a great deal as they dry, and repairing too early can mean doing it twice.
5. Then assess and repair. Once the wood has dried, we check which boards have recovered and which need replacing, and quote the repair.

Drying can take days or several weeks, depending on how much water there was and how long it sat. We check the moisture of the wood and the subfloor before we start, so the repair is done once.

Cupping is when the edges of each board rise higher than the middle, because the underside has taken on water. Crowning is the opposite, with the middle of each board higher than its edges, often after a cupped floor was sanded too soon. Dark stains and gray patches show where water sat on or soaked into the wood. Soft or springy spots can mean the subfloor underneath is damaged too. Gaps and lifting boards can follow once the wood dries and shrinks.

Some of these recover as the floor dries. Others mean the boards, and sometimes part of the subfloor, need to be replaced.

We cut out the damaged boards cleanly, without disturbing the good ones around them. Where the subfloor is damaged, we repair that first. New boards are then woven in, with their ends staggered to match the pattern of the existing floor, so the repair does not show as a patch.

Matching matters as much as fitting. We match the species, width and thickness of the boards, and on older floors we look for wood that matches the old grain. A new board is always lighter than the boards around it, so in most cases the repaired area, or the whole room, is sanded and refinished so the color blends evenly. That is where a repair meets hardwood floor restoration.

Whether a water-damaged floor is covered depends on your insurance policy and on where the water came from. In an apartment, the source may be the responsibility of the building or of another unit. Ask your insurer and your managing agent early, keep your photos, and keep any receipts for drying and repair. We can give you a written estimate for the repair to send to them.

A repair depends on how many boards need replacing, whether the subfloor is damaged, how hard the wood is to match, and whether the area or the room needs refinishing afterward to blend in. Pattern floors such as parquet and herringbone take longer to repair than straight boards. We look at the damage, often from photos first, and give you one estimate.