What is that last photo?

Where he cut into the wall trimming the stairway nose.
Did you have any feedback other than that?

Sorry, this is where the nosing SHOULD line up

Get with contractor right away and tell him this isn’t being done right. Stairs are an art in many ways and the sub is probably a rookie. Unfortunately, he has also caused terrible damage to your stairs. Look up International Residential Or International’s Building code requirements for stairs. Get educated yourself a bit so you are armed to deal with your contractor.

Thanks Flo.

I have fired the Sub and informed the GC. I’ll also research these regulations. If you know anyone in San Diego that is capable I’d be interested.

we also have a number of spots that pop and crack when walking on the floor. While he seemed to do a reasonable job of leveling the slab, I don’t think it’s good enough.

I will touch base with a designer friend of mine who is so cal and see if she has recommendation. You can also check for someone here on Houzz.

I have fired the Sub and informed the GC. I’ll also research these regulations. If you know anyone in San Diego that is capable I’d be interested.

Why are you doing the gc’s job? Not only is it his job to assess whether or not the stairs need to be meet certain requirements, it’s also his job to manage his crew—the sub contractor works for the general contractor, not you. Unless you caught him stealing or something equally blatantly against the law, it wasn’t your place to fire him and you could be in for some less-than-positive surprises as a result.

That’s why I suggested he contact his GC right away. Joe, make sure you are coordinating this thru your GC. You can give him names of craftsman who have the tools and expertise to fix this but be careful you are complying with your contract with the GC.

Just heard back from my friend and she doesn’t know of anyone in your area. Sorry. See what your GC says. It’s his duty to fix this.

Stairs are hell - especially when you change the type of floor. Going from carpet to rigid is always a battle. The rounded nosing for the carpet MUST come off. The stair edge must be squared. This is something that has to happen.

Because your stairs have stringers in some areas but not others, and have rounded corners (this is a technique that was popular in the 40's - 60's) this should have been discussed with you in GREAT DETAIL by the General Contractor. This is where the flooring PROFESSIONAL would have come in (at the GC's request) to speak with you about what is GOING to happen and how YOU would like it dealt with.

If you have a designer involved or a project manager, then these details would have been hashed out between the professionals and then a few solutions would have been brought to you (with a few tentative price quotes) and you would have made the final decision.

And one of the solutions offered to you would have been "replace stairs with new carpet".

Trim is up to the GC to discuss with you - the floor guy is there to install what the TWO OF YOU decided upon.

As for the popping and cracking, it could be the install or it could be the material itself (some LVP have issues with noise when walked upon...it's the noise of the click edge rubbing together).

Carpet hides a WEALTH of problems with slabs, stairs and wood subfloors. The amount of effort it takes to get it ready for "ultra flat" is impressive. The COST of the preparation will indicate which level of prep you got.

Here are some hints:

$1/sf prep = a small amount of filling and a little bit of sanding. And entire house can be done in a day by a single person.

$2/sf prep = medium amounts of sanding FIRST, a moderate amount of patching and then a small amount of sanding to knock down the rough bits of the patch

$3-$4/sf = full sand + full leveling + full sanding once again. Should take several days to complete a full house. Can be more than one set of hands doing this amount of work.

A house full of carpet = $2-$4/sf worth of prep depending on the AGE of the home.

And did you have underpadding used underneath the vinyl? If so, what was used? What's the LVP brand/line used?

The installer did you quite a bit of floating and grinding. The GC charged me about $1/ sf for the prep and it took him about 8 hours over the course of 2 days to do it.
There are still a few spots that sound like there’s sand underneath. I asked him in the 2nd day of floor install if it would get better and he claimed the flooring would ‘settle’ over time. At the same time I also heard the LVT is extremely unforgiving. We are using a product called SPC max from Republic Flooring. It has an underlayment attached to the plank. I was told by both the GC and the installer that additional underlayment wasn’t required. I checked the floor mfg website today and it states that the warranty is voided without underlayment being installed.
I appreciate the advice from everyone. I’ll give the GC his chance to fix the problem but also arm myself with additional knowledge as I was trusting these people apparently way too much.

Sad but true. Hope things work out. LVT is a product with amazing marketing. I have several clients who chose it for their new homes. One had to replace it after only 3 weeks in new home. Second try wasn’t much better. They actually sold that house and bought another new one but it has engineered wood. They love that. They have 2 large dogs too. Another client dislikes hers and plans to replace with hardwood in the Spring. I could go on. So hoping you keep your GCs feet to the fire on proper installation. Btw, call the manufacturer and ask questions. They “authorize” sellers and their reputation is riding on customer satisfaction.

Flo, that’s a great suggestion. I’ll do that tomorrow first thing.

take care

The existing black pieces look to have a wide chamfer where they'll meet the new flooring. If you line up the fronts as you wish, the tops will not line up due to the chamfer. The flooring and nosing would have to be lower to avoid exposing the ends of the flooring, therefore the round part of the nosing will never perfectly line up with the existing.

It may not be feasible to have the nosings extend out far enough past the existing risers to line up with the fronts of the existing nosings, without building out the risers. If the risers are built out to allow the nosings to line up, the risers will probably stick out past the existing risers, exposing the ends of the flooring. That won't look good. Take your first picture for example. If the nosing needs to extend another 1" to make it flush, the riser needs to be padded out 1" also. The nosing needs to support weight at the outer edge so it needs to be firmly attached. It can't hang out into space or foot traffic will likely cause it to become detached. Look at the existing riser. It appears to be out of plumb. Should the new riser line up? Should it also be out of plumb?

We don't know if the new flooring meets code in respect to tread heights and depths, nor do we know if the existing black nosings meet code.

To do this correctly you need to remove the existing balusters and nosings, make sure everything is prepped to allow the final result to meet codes, install the new flooring , then replace the balustrade and handrails.

As Johnson Flooring so concisely put it: stairs are hell. And they are massively expensive for the very reasons he states. As soon as stairs have a new surface put down (eg. going from carpet to rigid) they have to be brought up to code. And that's where things get super-expensive.

I'm sorry this has happened. Now that the nosings are gone, there is no easy fix. If it is possible, you might want to look at carpeting the stairs once again. I know it isn't ideal, but it will probably hide all the issues you currently have...and it means you do not have to update the stairs to meet today's code.

Ugh...

thanks!

really depressing

Yep. This is all due to the GC putting someone on this job that didn’t know what he was doing. Terrible disaster and fixing could bankrupt the GC. Man I wish there was some magic here. But stairs are really difficult.

Look at the bright side. You might be able to upgrade the stairs with new balusters etc. might want a more modern look? If you want to keep current style, fine, just looking for a silver lining. In any case, try to think about what good you can negotiate out of this situation.

Since considerable repairs will be needed time to figure out how you want your stairs to look in the end.

Not sure of the overall style and look of your home, and in the spirit of pulling a brilliant solution from this mess, what about a striking carpet on the stairs to distract the eye from the wood situation?

staircase · More Info

More ideas

Traditional Entry · More Info

Traditional Custom Home - Fairview Farms · More Info

The problem is that the plan was bad from the get go.

You have stairs with false treads and risers which are designed to work with carpeted stairs. Where it works fine.

Add another and different 'false tread & riser system', the SPC overlay, and it turns into an impossible thing to pull off. Like trying to fit a Chevy fender onto a Honda.

The only way to make it work will be to remove the handrail, balusters, false treads & risers and work with the stair accessories designed to work with the Republic SPC.

Or replace the old carpet with new carpet. Will need to glue & screw new nosings into place.

I feel sorry for the installer because he/she was given an impossible task. Hopefully they are now smarted up enough to turn down this sort of job.

CI_lantro thanks for your feedback.
In hindsight I completely agree with you. The GC was the one that actually recommended this to us and we were basically going along with his idea.
We found out today that he had actually never installed LVT flooring in a stairway like ours. We paid quite a bit of an up charge to him as well. I think we will end up doing exactly that now, fixing the nosing and putting new carpet again.
A hard lesson for everyone

Flo, thanks for the great ideas and pictures.
After all the feedback carpet looks like the best solution.
As some people commented, this whole thing could have been avoided with a thorough explanation and communication

I would negotiate with the GC to get him to cover A) repairing the stairs so carpet can be installed properly; B) covering any charges for an upgraded carpeting. Not saying "soak" him, but hey, he went way out of his expertise and he has to pay for pretty much ruining your stairs. Cutting that bullnose was a huge error. Gluing and screwing on new nosings is a chore in and of itself, and no guarantee that is going to last with long term wear on that front edge of the treads. Hope you get some great carpeting and can at least get the other aspects repaired too at no cost to you.

I feel for you, Joe. Looks as though this was entirely the contractor's screw-up. IF he had hired a competent, experienced sub, the sub would have warned him this couldn't be pulled off with the materials provided & the added expense of dealing with the balusters & handrail & exacting labor fashioning mitered returns on the end of the open stairs. But that wouldn't excuse the contractor from not knowing what he didn't & should have known.

As for the upcharge, that needs to go away. Contractor needs to eat that as well as the expense of returning the stairs to original condition (before the nosings were hacked away.) The only thing you should be paying for is the new carpet & installation labor/ materials. Which still wouldn't make you whole because of the angst & time delay all of this has caused you. Something I would chalk up to the cost of education, lessons learned.

Please update with how this turns out, wouldya'?