The Garage (Apartment)- Part 5

(continued from part 1, part 2, part 3, and part 4) 


The stain is on the concrete!


We decided to stain the floors for a few reasons:

• The sheet vinyl that we ripped up caused mold issues and we wanted to go with something that would allow the flooring to breath a bit more.
• The stained look is popular with our target tenants.
• We knew that we could DIY the project and do it for less $$ than most other options.
• It would be a pretty green choice: no ugly temporary flooring to rip up in the future.
• If we hated it, we could always put a different flooring choice over it. 

Obviously, paint would have been an almost equivalent choice, but we liked the *idea* of a more textured surface. We went with grey because the bathroom tiles were already a darker greyish tone and it seemed like a good idea at the time.


To stain the floors, we basically followed the instructions on the back of the cans: 

1. clean floor
2. etch floor (found in the paint section next to stain)
3. wait overnight
4. clean/ dampen 
5. spray stain 
6. wait overnight again
7. spray stain again and roll to even out look
8. wait overnight AGAIN
9. spray stain in random spots that we missed
10. wait overnight again and thank ourselves for being smart enough to make this a weekday project instead of a weekend project
11. use sealer

etching using bug chemical sprayer:

Don't worry, it took about 45 seconds to realize that we had forgotten to put on our masks!

The individual steps were pretty simple. I did spray some stain on the walls a couple of times, but we fixed that issue by using a roller in the edges. Oh, and there was the fact that we are not experienced/ artistic enough to make anything close to a natural-looking texture on the floors:

 Not cute!

And, another re-do...

Luckily, there was the flat-look option that we ended up achieving after rolling out the stain:

Last week:

Now:

I can't say that I think it's the most wonderful, fabulous result, but it's much better than the flooring before. Most importantly, I don't think that any potential tenants will be afraid of it.


Also, we're seriously considering going ahead and buying an apartment-sized stove (thanks to your persuasive comments). The electrician is coming this afternoon so we should know if it's even possible today.