Carter Wood Floors

I have to admit, I was a little skeptical based on some of the reviews people have left, but I didn’t have any issues. Kevin came to our house the next day and gave us a detailed quote and answered my questions. His crew came the next morning and in the course of 2 – 3 days over the holiday they wrapped up the project. His team spoke english, were nice and took the time to hang bags over cabinets etc. They will be back to do the second part of the house later this year.

HORRIBLE customer service. They were great about coming out to measure, but I’ve called FOUR times in TWO WEEKS and no one has gotten back to me with an estimate. They have done good work for us in the past, but to not return a call on a repeat customer is unacceptable.

Terrific! These folks were fast, courteous and just plain wonderful! The floors underneath the carpet were scary. We thought for sure we would have to have new floors. However, these folks not only cleaned and patched but refinished our floor to a beautiful finish with a lot of shine. All done within a very short span of time.
I highly recommend these folks… I wish we would have done this years ago!
M.Hill RN
R. DeVore

Kevin Carter is one of the best. He started out in this business many years ago when pulling up carpet and exposing the beautiful wood floors many of the older home feature became popular. He does a lot of the work for Long Beach Schools. Full service, new, repair and refinish. What a lot of people don’t know is that you can only sand and refinish the small 1 ½″, 3/​8ths thick floors in the 30’s Spanish houses once. After that you will sand to expose the nails. Carter will tell you that up front.
What got me was I wanted a few strips of used, pulled up wood flooring for a very small patch job. He GAVE them to me, no charge! Now I hope I’m not getting him in trouble; don’t expect free goods, OK?

This review is fairly difficult to write because elements of the job were excellent; while others — mainly the owners — were not.
I’ll explain what we had done:
1950’s ranch style house with pre-​existing wood flooring in majority of the home. Previous «flippers» had removed approximately 40% of original flooring and replaced with very thick cherry plank. We had previously refinished the original flooring 12+ years ago and wanted to remove cherry and then replace with matching 1 ½″ oak flooring and refinish the whole house.
When first contacting Carter’s, their response was prompt and thorough. Jim arrived at our house and gave us a bid for adding the new flooring and refinishing the whole house. The bid was broken down by labor and materials in a clear way. He explained additional pricing options for extra layers of clear coat and staining options in a clear manner.
After we agreed to do the work, the flooring was delivered and installed in one day. We then waited 11 days before sanding and finishing (per company guidelines, which were previously explained.).
Once the physical labor of installation and refinishing began we never heard from Jim nor Kevin (owner). Despite questions along the way, and phone calls, we heard nothing until we mentioned we would hold final payment
During each step we had concerns and questions and — especially the day of installation — the men doing the work had extremely limited English skills. There were several pieces of flooring that had to be glued in place due to kitchen cabinet layout and having to trim down full planks to smaller pieces. The glue did not set on these and the pieces were loose. We tried to communicate this to the workers and we got blank stares. Additionally, two pieces were laid unevenly and dipped far beneath the other pieces and these could not be addressed either.
We had been informed that if any pieces of our existing flooring needed to be replaced, it would be $ 10/​board. Acceptable price for material and labor. HOWEVER, when we knew that pieces near our entry threshold would need replacing, we could not convey this to the crew. We called and left THREE messages with Jim and the main office line with no response. Our concern stemmed from the fact that it was made extremely clear that the new wood had to acclimate to our house for a bare minimum of 10 days. Should these random, replaced new boards need to do the same? Especially if being melded with 60+ year old original boards? This concern was expressed during our messages.
Finally we got a call back — with an annoyed tone — that these boards would be replaced during the sanding process. That’s fine, but then they would be immediately sanded, stained and refinished. Why was it okay for these to ignore the 10-​day acclimation period?
The day of sanding, the job foreman — Carlos — was extremely knowledgeable. He communicated with us what he was doing and when/​why. The problem was that we didn’t get to fully inspect the sanding job before stain went on. There were some patches in the house that needed definite attention — and we were told they would by Carlos (he explained how he could «feather» the dips and dings to some degree. These problem spots were caused when the floor was refinished 12 years ago.). The problem was, that when he evened out these spots, some boards should have been replaced because nailheads showed through. But these issues weren’t pointed out and we were not given this option.
There was just one living space in the house that was not being refinished — our 1 guest bedroom. We asked early on if we should vacate the house or if we could stay in this one bedroom. We were given a flaccid «okay» to stay in the house. The day Carlos sanded and stained the floor, I asked him just to make sure what Jim had told us was accurate. Carlos paused for a few moments and really contemplated his answer. He said yes we could stay, but with hesitation. He said he would do his best to tape off the hallway space to keep the fumes from coming in. This gave me pause as my wife was — at that time — 8 months pregnant (a fact not at all hidden when she met with Jim for the bid/​consultation). Upon telling Carlos this, he emphatically stated that no, we should not be in the house.
Why wasn’t this information conveyed during any of the other steps in the process so we could make timely arrangements?
It took a LOT of phone calls to get any response. When Carter’s finally sent a representative it wasn’t someone who spoke much English. The only reason they helped us is because we withheld final payment. We never got the 3^rd transition piece. They scratched our brand new kitchen base cabinets. Once they got the job, Kevin and Jim treated it as an annoyance. Their sanding and clear coat foremen were great and easy to work with — kind and knowledgeable. Sadly, the main bosses — Kevin Carter and Jim S. — have made us look elsewhere for wood floor refinish

I had quite a bit of hardwood flooring to be refinished that had been almost ruined from our dog and chlorine pool. Carter Woods gave us a reasonable quote and began work almost immediately. The men showed up everyday and were very patient in blending stains to get the right color. My floor is beautiful and I get so many compliments.

Used them to refinish our wood floors. They completed the job in three days. We are very happy with the work. Would highly recommend using them.

I love my refinished wood floors! After over 30 years of carpet in this 1952 built rental home, I decided to expose the wood floors and give them the «Mop N Glo treatment». Yikes! Four areas had been repaired with plywood and there were pet and drink stains. I called Carter’s for a bid on repair. Jim gave me two bids both repair only and refinish. The price was so good and they could start right away, I decided on the full refinish. They sanded, repaired, stained and 2 coats of poly… it looks fantastic! They gave me a firm, written bid, easy to contact, showed up on time, cleaned up each day (3 day process) and made these old floors look new! 5 stars!

If you want someone to charge you for the work they do… and then charge you again after a couple of months and then make you have to go through the hassle of a dispute process, well, this is your place. If you want a job done well and courteously try another place. Rude unprofessional stay away

This was one of the worst companies to deal with. The owner has no customer service skills and did not use the non-​toxic materials requested. I would never recommend them to anyone!

Prompt and courteous in my request for an estimate, but I didn’t use them because they were about 15% higher than my other bid. The company I went with did an outstanding job, so it worked out.

Carter Wood Floors refinished my 70 year old floors and made them look like new! Kevin Carter the owner of the company guided me through the process. From the 1^st time I met with him, I knew that his company was the one.
I would recommend Carter Wood Floors to anyone!
Here is their web site