Congratulatins on your new home.

Here are a few things to think about:

1. Before you start changing flooring in the kitchen, you need to live in the space for long enough to know that you don't want to make any other changes. The time period that is often recommended is 6 to 12 months.

1A. You will be asked by someone to show the whole kitchen. Possibly with drawings and measurements. The goal of those who will ask will be to identify anything that you mgiht want to change. These suggestions could be very inexpensive, or quite costly. You do not want to change the flooring now and then decide to make changes to the kitchen next year.

2. One flooring throughout a level in the home is highly recommended on Houzz. That would mean extending the oak flooring into the kitchen. Your oak flooring would look fantastic with your kitchen cabinets. You can get unfinished solid or engineered wood finished to match your existing oak flooring.

2A. The Houzz floor police will chastize you greatly if you consider putting "fake" wood floors next to "real" wood floors. Fake wood floors include LVP, LVT, and wood-look tiles.

3. There's nothing wrong with the kitchen tile you have, but if you want a change, you want a change. A slate look porcelain tile would look nice.

4. Whatever flooring you get for the kitchen, buy more than you need. Unless you are doing unfinished wood, you will never find a match for it in a couple of years when something goes wrong.

5. Do not pick out a new backsplash until you have decided on the flooring. If you decide to change the countertops, your decisions should be made in this order: (1) flooring, (2) countertop (3) backsplash.

Good luck with your project!

Hi, thank you so much for all the helpful advice — it’s been really insightful! We actually love the idea of extending the oak floors into the kitchen. Our only hesitation is whether that would mean we’d need to refinish all the existing floors to ensure the stain matches perfectly. The rest of the flooring is in great shape, so we’re hoping to avoid sanding everything if possible.

We’re also planning to replace the backsplash with something more neutral once we move in, but we’ll be keeping the existing cabinets and countertops for the next few years.

As recommended- floor plan and more pictures.

ChatGPT image of extending the floors- I think this is the right answer.

I would do NOT one thing, until I lived in this house for a solid year and make DARN SURE

I wanted my kitchen that closed off........

The real estate photo's are very misleading

This is truth below : )

No way in heck, would I touch flooring yet.

Another vote for extending the wood floors into the kitchen ... but only after you have lived in the house for 6+ months and you know that you don't need/want to remodel the kitchen layout and/or move any walls. Act in haste repent at leisure.

Thank you everyone, I wish I could respond directly to your comments. Agree waiting for a year. However, we are having a child in six months and I feel like if it is not done now, it won’t be down for years. We do not plan on opening the kitchen, I actually prefer a closed off kitchen from the home- happy to hear ideas on how it could’ve more open.

Actually.....

Here's a thread for you......call it the WHY of delay. Yours not nearly as tragic, btw : )

https://www.houzz.com/discussions/6512516/can-you-help-with-my-kitchen-design-and-layout#29626873

Thanks Jan, will be reading!!!

Options for porcelain tile.

You "prefer" a closed off kitchen , but you do not have a child.........yet : )

The problem with replacing floors in an existing kitchen is that you can't run the floors under the cabinets. Best practices is that kitchens are done with the floors installed first, and the cabinets on top of them. That's why we're recommending you wait until you've lived in the house for a good long time before replacing just the floors. You may find that the layout really doesn't work and you need to change it.

Another consideration is that you don't know what condition the subfloors are in, so if you discover that you need to replace the subfloors after you demolish the tile, you're really in a pickle.

I completely understand wanting to tackle this. We bought our first house when I was six months pregnant with the goal of renovating and being done before baby two arrived. We missed it by two weeks but that’s another story. I will say it is true if you don’t do it now you are looking at years. But you don’t want to do something now that is wasted either. Are you sure the only change you want in the home is to the kitchen flooring? If you think even five years from now a bigger renovation is on deck I would wait and live with it. If you feel confident that the flooring is the only major change then change it now before you are in. We changed almost everything inside and out and I have zero regrets. I’m so glad we got it done right away.

I dislike the grey wall paint by far more than the kitchen floors. It is the totally wrong paint color for both the wood floors and the kitchen floor -- it detracts from them rather than complements them.

First thing I'd do is paint all the grey walls in a color that complements the wood floors, such as a soft creamy white, before I did anything else. Do that and then reassess the major change of flooring -- change of paint will make a world of difference here.

Agree with porkchop. Having a baby and taking on renovations is a lot to handle in a new to you house. It looks like the previous owner got ”gray fever” - get rid of it. Paint the rooms a light warm white , have the baby and live with kitchen before you do anything. You’ll figure out your needs over time. enjoy being a new mom.

Patience. You and your home both deserve a well thought out plan. Love your windows! Enjoy your new home and soon to be little one in the meantime!

Yes, your kitchen looks perfectly functional at present. When we bought our house as young newlyweds, the kitchen was from the 1960s/70s, complete with ugly linoleum floor, no counter space, old wonky cabinets, terrible lighting, peeling wallpaper and wood-look laminate on what little counters we had. We lived with that kitchen for 4 years, but spent that time planning and saving for our dream kitchen. The new kitchen served us well for 27 years, until we decided to make another change. I think this one will be our last LOL!!

You won't go wrong by waiting, especially with a new baby.

So, here’s another point of view. Changing the floors now means you won’t have to live with floors you dislike and make the change with a newborn in the house. Absolutely change them now, then nest for a while. The stain you’ve got really looks like a clear finish on classic red oak. Any floor installer will be able to get close enough.

Agree @eam44! I would have gone batty sitting there with a newborn looking at a space I didn’t like had we not changed it. Instead I was looking out at a beautiful space and relaxed.

You can take your time with the backsplash if you want - that’ll be a day to demo and install, and a few hours to grout. Plus you get time to think about tile between now and whenever you choose it. I was playing with the notion of bringing the oak color into the bs (you don’t have to do this at all, but i think that’s what the previous owners were going for). I found some talavera tiles that uses a terra cotta glaze. It’s just a thought experiment.

Or, you can celebrate the white and bring in whatever color you love.

Thank you everyone! This was my first time posting here and it was very helpful.. in the coming days I would like to post the rest of the house. Would love to hear my thoughts. And agree on the paint color! That will be changed, but definitely want to be in the space to see how the rooms feel and light interacts with everything. Glad the walls are not offensive, very livable.