Flooring Under New Cabinets?

merryanne2013

12 years ago

I am gutting and redoing my kitchen. The quotes for this Varies. One company says to put the new floor (wood) under the cabinets before installation and another says to install the cabinets first on the concrete floor and add the flooring after. Which is the best way to do this?

Featured Answer

PRO

GN Builders L.L.C

12 years ago

There is a few ways of doing this.

If you going to use unfinished flooring, and do sanding and staining later, you install your floor first wall to wall.

If you going to use pre-finished flooring, you have to raise your cabinets the floor thickness... We use pieces of the same flooring material which will be used. When flooring is being installed, the installer will take the front and side pieces out and slip flooring under it.

Don't let them set your cabinets on the floor and install the floor later, you can end up with a major issue getting your dishwasher out down the road if service needed after the tops installed. Seen this happen 100 times.

Some people will install pre-finished flooring before kitchen install, but then you have to much traffic there.i.e kitchen installation, finished plumbing to be done, finish electrical work, counter top installation, etc and the floor can get easily damaged and everyone starts to blame everyone who did it.
So to save yourself a headache, raise the cabinets up and install your finished flooring after everyone is out of there.

Here is an image to give you an idea with pre-finished flooring.

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Comments (7)

lopipopi
12 years ago
Depends on who you ask. Cabinet installers say flooring goes in last so that they don't have to worry about damaging the floor. Flooring guys say the opposite. They are both trying to cover their butts. Which installer do you trust more?
merryanne2013 thanked lopipopi
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valtex
12 years ago
We put our ceramic tile flooring under the cabinets because we wanted to plan ahead in case of some scenario where cabinets must be replaced or reconfigured. Like a flood or appliance overflow which could damage cabinets. That said, it is personal preference but, DO remember to allow for the increased floor height if you floor under the cabinets. Not only just the addition of flooring, but the addition of slab leveling material which should happen under wood flooring too. Unless your slab is extremely level. The small increase can effect your cabinet measurements as well as outlet distance from the floor. My new range sits not quite completely installed for just this reason. The outlet is a smidgen too low and must be moved up for the range to be pushed back to the wall.
merryanne2013 thanked valtex
User
12 years ago
Floating or glue down? Floating floors should never be pinned down by installing the cabinets on top of them.
merryanne2013 thanked User
PRO
Scott Design, Inc.
12 years ago
last modified: 12 years ago
I typically run the finished floor material to the walls (except floating floors) taking advantage of the same type of material supporting the cabinet throughout.
Putting all four sides of your base cabinets on a solid, uniform, consistent floor assembly is the best scenario.

My primary concern with any floor is its ability to maintain the overall weight of cabinets with heavy tops (stone, engineered quartz, etc) over the long haul .

Cabinets should not be installed on a subfloor alone using blocking/shims as leveling devices. Subfloors are not meant to bear weight in and of themselves. There's too much deflection and many times they have been split, loosened, patched, etc. during demolition. Typical wooden shims (shingles, blocks and strips) can compress and even split under the weight of stone tops over the long haul. That could lead to out-of-level tops, open and crooked joints at the backsplash and countertop seams that are no longer flush.
merryanne2013 thanked Scott Design, Inc.
PRO
GN Builders L.L.C
12 years ago
You never use shingles, shims or anything other than flooring material of same thickness and you will never have any issues supporting granite or anything else. You cabinet installer will know how to raise the cabinets, its been done like this for decades.

x2 what Valtex and Fred said, when doing tiles, tile goes in first...
merryanne2013 thanked GN Builders L.L.C
merryanne2013
Original Author
12 years ago
Thank you everyone. You have been extremely helpful.