Hardwood Floor Refinishing, Cleaning

I recommend using Bruce Hardwood Floor Cleaner. I get it at home depot. You buy a starter kit that comes with a dry mop with a terry clothe towel cover. You spray and mop. You should never use water on hardwood floors. It will ruin it. I have used orange glo also. It didnt seem to clean to well. My house is 1600 sq ft and is all hard wood floors besides bathrooms and a bottle of the Bruce last me approx 3 cleanings

Once they are grey it means all the varnish is off and the wood has naturally aged, the air has got to them. I would if you could get them done sooner than later if you leave them the deeper the damage goes. Sanding them back may remove some of the gray depending on how deep it has gone! I use Murphy's oil to clean mine. You can buy it ready to use or to dilute. I buy to dilute and only clean them once a month with it. In between I use just regular water to spot clean on my hands and knees.Never leave pools of water to stand on the floor as this is what damages the floor I use a swiffer duster to dust every couple of days. I also use a dust buster to pick up after meals.
Good Luck and congrats on your new house!

I would have them done as the new sealer will protect them. Get a few bids b/c we had it done last year and there was a huge descrepancy on how much it cost with each company. We did the dustless sanding with a company and it was clean. The moved our fridge to do under there too and I think the 600 sq ft. or so cost about $950 maybe. I don't remember. Also, the most popular cleaner to use that is safe is Bona. Almost all wood floor people tell you to you to use it or water. Good luck.

I suggest Basic H2 by Shaklee to clean your floors. The bottle will last forever because it is concentrated, and it is non-toxic. I use it on my wood floors and they look great. And that's all I use.

Let me know if you want a link to buy it online.

You can use pine sol but not as much water as you would use on vinyl type flooring. Also, the wood floors are supposed to be sanded and revarnished every 5 years, but to tell you the truth we haven't done ours yet and we've been here 8 years. They came out with a new product called bona. They have an entire line, but for 15.00 you can get a 32 ounce bottle and it will reseal your floor without sanding it. It takes 2 hours to dry and 24 hours before heavy foot traffic and putting your furniture back in. You can choose low shine or a high shine.

A good friend of ours does high quality hardwood floor refinishing and installation, so I will tell you what he has told us. Likely, they can be sanded down and redone at some point, unless it's significant water damage down through or something, but even then, you could probably do a darker stain when you refinish them. I don't think waiting will make much of a difference. If they are oak, you can usually do it several times during their lifetime.
As for cleaning, our friend always recommends soap and water - not any of those fancy cleaners. Good Luck.

I wouldn't say they will come up noe matter how long you wait to refinish them...
Oak hardwood floors generally show wear after about 10 years - that means scratches in their surface, and some high traffic wear. Because they are grey... that is a bit confusing to me. That might mean that the varnish is entirely gone, which wouldn't be a good thing. The reason is that you can actually wear the floors down in the high traffic areas and your floors would be uneven, or take an incredible amount of sanding to refinish at that point.

I have heard that refinishing the floors is a crazy mess, evn when they say they are catching all the dust, it goes everywhere.

The important thing with hardwoods is to get all the dirt off them as frequently as possible. It's the dirt that is wearing them down - small grains of sand trapped under a shoe or foot grinding into the wood. So clean them with a dust mop often. When you clean them with water, we used a hardwood floor cleaner machine that sucks up all the water which makes it really easy - we do that once a week with about a tablespoon of their cleaning solution. It lasts a long time though. Some people use vinegar and water to clean, that is probably fine too.

I would have a professional come assess your floors. Don't commit, but at least hear what they have to say. You don't want to have to replace the floor.

You don't mention how big the house is, but when we refinished our floors, the most expensive thing was the sander, so it's really not that expensive of a job to do. We did it ourselves. It didn't seem to be too big of a job, but I was 8 months pregnant, so I wasn't anywhere near it, either. As far as waiting goes, I don't think it would be a problem, although, if the wood is unprotected, you run the risk of the wood being damaged and eventually needing to be replaced instead of just resanded. Not to mention, it's much easier to do in a house with no furniture. If I recall right, it was a 3 day job, done each night after work, but it was 7 years ago, so I could be wrong. Anyway, congratulations on the new house! Enjoy!