DIY Stained Concrete Floors

**Mergie Master** · 06-13-2012, 01:09 AM

I was looking in another forum and there was a post by a guy who said him and his brother decided to stain the concrete floors in one of them house. He posted an album of before and after pictures. I had no idea you could do this with concrete. I swear it looks like marble or something. Much prettier than hardwood or carpet in my opinion.

He said the prep work was the hardest part, all the taping and stuff like that. It was their first time doing this so they just did the research, mostly online. He also said it was a lot of work but mostly it was just patience, taking their time and making sure they did everything right.

Maintenance/Upkeep according to him is simply mopping on a coat of wax in high traffic areas every 6 months or so.

Here's the pictures with a few of before and and some in-progess pic.

▬ ▬ Before ▬ ▬

▬ ▬ After ▬ ▬

**Mergie Master** · 06-13-2012, 01:10 AM

Now with the furniture back in the house:

**Mergie Master** · 06-13-2012, 01:13 AM

I might just go in my basement, where I have a room with a bare concrete floor, and section the floor off into 10 or 12 sections and practice doing this with all kinds of designs. Then when I get confident go out and make some extra money doing it for folks that want their floors done.

A lot of people have concrete floors in their basements and carport/garage bonus rooms. You could really spice up a game room or basement guest room with this.

**duckduckdog** · 06-13-2012, 06:26 AM

that looks pretty sweet!

**Mergie Master** · 06-13-2012, 06:31 AM

It looks almost like marble or granite floors.

I honestly didn't know you could do that with plain concrete. I'm telling you if a man practiced this a little and showed some brochures or pictures of his work he could make some money doing this for people. I'm seriously thinking about it. I need to do some research.

**carolinaboy06** · 06-13-2012, 06:37 AM

One cool thing, Merg, is you aren't limited to straight lines. I have seen plenty where the floor looks like it was made of large flat rough edged stones with a grout in between. The possibilities are endless.

**Mergie Master** · 06-13-2012, 06:38 AM

Originally Posted by carolinaboy06

One cool thing, Merg, is you aren't limited to straight lines. I have seen plenty where the floor looks like it was made of large flat rough edged stones with a grout in between. The possibilities are endless.

Cool. So you've seen this before?

**duckduckdog** · 06-13-2012, 06:40 AM

The Wal-Mart here is all stained concrete floors. No designs like they did, but it actually looks good.

**charlie horse** · 06-13-2012, 06:45 AM

..all that time they spent on the floors, they could at least adjust the rear legs on that dishwasher. Merg a lot of the newer restaurants and stores around cola are doing an etched and stained concrete..most people wont notice or think its something else.

**carolinaboy06** · 06-13-2012, 06:51 AM

Originally Posted by Mergie Master

Cool. So you've seen this before?

Time and time again. Never seen one that I haven't liked either. It's definitely one of the newer trends, especially for the residential market. Restaurants do it all the time. (Easy to clean, won't break like tile, I believe the overall cost is much cheaper as well.)

When I was building houses, there were a few houses that we did that homeowners had their basement concrete stained. ( I will tell you thought, these were $500k plus homes and that was the only place you'd find concrete in those houses, other than the garage.)

You could make a killing in the sub divisions where the houses are built on slabs though.

**carolinaboy06** · 06-13-2012, 06:52 AM

Originally Posted by charlie horse

..all that time they spent on the floors, they could at least adjust the rear legs on that dishwasher. Merg a lot of the newer restaurants and stores around cola are doing an etched and stained concrete..most people wont notice or think its something else.

X2

**Mergie Master** · 06-13-2012, 06:55 AM

Originally Posted by carolinaboy06

You could make a killing in the sub divisions where the houses are built on slabs though.

That's what I was thinking too.

There ain't as many of those kind of houses up here as there are in the lower parts of the state. I don't know why that is, but the majority of houses up this way the floors or on studs or crossbeams, whatever you'd call it. They have crawl spaces under the houses.

**carolinaboy06** · 06-13-2012, 06:57 AM

A lot of it has to do with the lay of the land. Down in the Lexington/Columbia area, they are tons of them. In my area of the upstate where it's much more hilly, there are some subdivisions with slabs but the greater majority are built on a foundation.

**Mergie Master** · 06-13-2012, 07:00 AM

I'm in Greenwood and that's the way it is here too. I know down in places like South Georgia and Florida almost all of the newer houses are on slabs.

**Mergie Master** · 06-13-2012, 07:03 AM

Originally Posted by charlie horse

..all that time they spent on the floors, they could at least adjust the rear legs on that dishwasher.

They said it was their parent's house.

Merg a lot of the newer restaurants and stores around cola are doing an etched and stained concrete..most people wont notice or think its something else.

I guess I just haven't been paying attention. It looks like it could be marble or granite or something. I wouldn't have thought it was just concrete had I not read that thread on the other forum.

Have you done any or seen any being done?

**rodandgun83** · 06-13-2012, 08:37 AM

Wheres the pics?

**Rafterbm** · 06-13-2012, 01:22 PM

What forum did you find that on? We were looking at doing that to our house and that was the best looking job I've seen

**Duke** · 06-13-2012, 01:40 PM

In the higher end neighborhoods in my area, many folks are doing their concrete driveways like this too. There's certainly some money to be made in it.

Mergie...We have some friends (in your neck of the woods) on Lake Greenwood that stained the concrete when they finished their basement. It looks sharp.