How to Measure Your Carpeting Costs before Choosing the Right Carpet

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When your looking to add new or replace carpeting in your home, one of the first things you'll want to consider is should I do it my self or hire a professional. A professional carpet installer may charge you anywhere from $2.50 - $6.25 dollars and up per square yard depending on the type and quality of the carpet you choose.

Hiring a carpet professional is hardly feasible for many folks in todays economy. It just makes good sense to do the work yourself today. It's not hard to go through the process of measuring, purchasing and doing the work of installing the carpet yourself. Providing you are physically able to do so.

Save Your Money

If your on a limited budget and still would like to have good quality carpet in your home then doing it your self will be the best bet. If you don't mind a little elbow grease (work), then you can save a ton of money and get that perfect carpet that you've always wanted for your home.

In this article we will talk about how you can do the work yourself and save big money. I will tell you about 2 things associated with getting the job underway that are the most important parts. Those are:

How to Measure your Room(s)

Carpeting Costs

Get the Right Numbers

The most important of these being your carpet cost. When starting out the process use a measuring tape to measure your room(s). For this process I will use a simple 15' ft. by 20' ft. room for example. The process of measuring is the same for any size room(s). Let's get started:

Simply measure the width of the room and the length of it

Multiply the width by the length to get the total square footage of the room(s). 15' ft. x 20' ft. = 300

(Note that most carpet comes in 12' ft. wide rolls.) So for our example to get the total square yardage needed you divide by 9:

Divide the 300 total square footage by 9 which comes out to 33.33 square yards

For our example there would need to be a 3' ft. x 20' ft. seam along one of the walls in the room. The reason being is because as mentioned a moment ago, carpet comes from the factory in 12' ft. wide rolls. Of course if at all possible you would rather complete the job without having any seams. Makes less work.

You should always add about 10% percent more square foot to the total to make up for any extra carpet needed to complete the work.

There are other widths that may be available other than 12' ft. wide. Such as 13'.6" and 15' ft. Depending on the size of course of the room your doing. Check with your carpet store where you are planning on purchasing from.

Count Your Pennies

Thats a fairly simple process of coming to the conclusion on the amount of carpet needed to get your carpeting job completed. Now, let's move to the important part in my opinion, understanding the carpeting cost. Carpet costs can range anywhere from $7.00 dollars a square yard to $50 dollars per square yard depending on the quality.

So what are the advantages and disadvantages of the different qualities of carpets. Simply just, wear ability. For example the cheap carpet will most likely look just as good to the eye as the expensive, but in terms of longevity is where you'll see the difference.

Then theres the cost of the padding if you want that cushy feeling under your feet when you lay or walk on it. Padding cost can run anywhere from $1.75 to $5.50 per square yard. So thats something also to consider when figuring in your carpet costs. Measure it the same way as before.

measuring for carpet costs and installation

Ok, let's have a look at some examples to help you when considering carpet costs and the price of carpet.

Cheap Carpet or Low Grade Carpet

Average Lasting or Longevity:

Low Traffic - ~ 4 years

Medium Traffic - ~ 3 years

High Traffic - ~ 2 years

Carpet Cost $7.00 to 10.00 per sq. yd.

Average Cost per square yard installed - $12.00 to $15.00 per yard

Professional installation costs - $2.50 to 3.00 per sq. yd.
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Medium Grade Carpet

Average Lasting or Longevity

Low Traffic - ~ 12 years

Medium Traffic - ~ 9 years

Heavy Traffic - ~ 7 years

Carpet Cost $15.00 to 20.00 per sq. yd.

Average cost per square yard installed - $23 to $30 per yard

Professional Installation Costs - $3.75 to 6.25 per sq. yd.
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High Grade or High Quality Carpet

Average Lasting or Longevity

Low Traffic - ~ 20 years

Medium Traffic - ~ 15 years

Heavy Traffic - ~ 12 years

Carpet Cost $20.00 to 50.00 per sq. yd.

Average cost per square yard installed - $28 to $55 per yard

Professional Installation Costs - $5.75 to $8.25 per sq. yd.
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There you have some of the primary costs associated with purchasing carpeting. To show you how much money you can save by doing the installation yourself we will use our example above. In our example we came to a total square yards needed of roughly 36.33. Remember, we added 10% more to make sure we have enough to complete the work.

Feast on the Savings!

Now, let me lay out for you the savings by doing the work yourself in all 3 categories we talked about above, for carpet costs. Using just a rough average of the professional installation costs mentioned in each.

Cheap Carpet or Low Grade - 36.33 x $2.75 per Sq.Yd. = $99.91 or 100 dollars saved!

Medium Grade Carpet - 36.33 x $5.00 per Sq.Yd. = $181.65 dollars saved!

High Grade, High Quality - 36.33 x $7.00 per Sq.Yd. = $254.31 dollars saved!

lady measuring for carpeting installation

Pretty significant isn't it? Thats money in your pocket by doing the work yourself. Installing or laying carpet isn't hard. Specially if you have someone helping you do it. You'll want to also remember to figure in your carpet padding as well to your purchase if you choose to have that.

The Conclusion

You certainly can have the carpet you want and save a significant amount of money in the process. I highly recommend if your physically able, to do it this way. Especially if your on a tight budget and have need for or want new carpet in your home.

If you have any questions about how to lay or install the carpet, just leave them in the comments section and I can help you with that. If there is enough questions asked and interest, I may just write an article on how to do it.

Hope this article brings good ideas and benefit to you...

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