Tip for anyone buying new carpet

skintc

Hi everyone, this is my first post, hope I found the right place to put it!

Anyway, I visit this site and forum several times a week, and felt like it was about time I contributed something. Here's a little something my hubby and I did to save money a little while back.

We're currently fixing up our house which we bought early this year. And when it came to carpets, we were going up the wall. You've got to work out the price of the carpet, the underlay, the fitting... Every shop claimed to have the cheapest this, or the cheapest that. But overall they seemed to come to the same. Some would have cheap carpet, but hike up the price of the underlay or the fitting to make up the difference.

So here's what we did.

We found the cheapest place for carpet itself was one of the major national retailers (not sure if I can mention the name, but it includes the word carpet!) But when we sat down to do the figures with the man in the shop, the fitting cost LOADS more than anywhere else, and their underlay was a lot more. So what we did was, we bought the carpet from there and had it delivered to the house. Then, we went back to one of the previous shops whose carpets weren't as cheap or nice quality, and asked them if they'd fit the carpet for us. We also got the underlay from them aswell, as it was a lot cheaper.

All in all, we saved between £200-300.

So my advice is to not just shop around (which is a no brainer) but try and get each part from a different store, whoever claims to have the cheapest. Our fitters only charged £1.50 per sq metre, but the store we bought the carpet from were going to charge us £4.50. And the guys did a great job. Sometimes you have to be wary of fitters, but hey, you don't pay them til they're finished, so just make sure you're happy with the job before handing the money over.

So um, that's it. Hope this is helpful to someone.

Bethany


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latecomer

We're going to be looking for carpet in the near future and that sounds like good advice!

Thanks

avstar

Thanks Skintc - great first post !:T

Alias_Omega

Also, measure up and check the end of roll items at the back of the store, and when you find one you like, haggle on the price as you will take it there and then.

Gripper rod can be bought for £20 a box on eBay, and underlay too, though a decent carpet wont need underlay. But if your a !!!!!, you can use the old carpet as underlay. Just turn it over..

ayla261

we bought our last carpet from b&q, hubby spent day laying it only to find a stain along the bit of carpet that had been showing on display. I phoned the store and explained and before i even started going off my head (lol) they offered 50% of purchase price as refund, which we took as store vouchers

Rumman

Also check your yellow pages for carpet fitting, it's often cheaper, they charge a fixed amount for the room, had an 18ft by 12ft room fitted for 20 quid.

candles65

If anyone is looking for quality carpets the famous carpet makers in Devon (not sure if I can mention the name) has a seconds store..The staff are so helpful and patient you could spend all day looking and they do not pressure you, only found out about it a month ago and got my dream carpet which retails in all the larger department stores for £58 per m now have it at £19 per m and the fault is not noticable as have used it on the stairs, well worth the trip as we spent the rest off the day on beach in Lyme Regis (5 mins from shop).:rotfl:

tarajayne

candles65 wrote: »

If anyone is looking for quality carpets the famous carpet makers in Devon (not sure if I can mention the name) has a seconds store..The staff are so helpful and patient you could spend all day looking and they do not pressure you, only found out about it a month ago and got my dream carpet which retails in all the larger department stores for £58 per m now have it at £19 per m and the fault is not noticable as have used it on the stairs, well worth the trip as we spent the rest off the day on beach in Lyme Regis (5 mins from shop).:rotfl:

Axminster Carpets. We live 5 minutes away.;)

shelley_crow

Also, if you live near Kidderminster in Worcestershire it's the carpet capital of the country. There's about 20 carpet factory shops and retail outlets almost in the same road, all offer end of rolls very cheap.

yllas_2

we found that Trago mills (in Newton Abbot, Falmouth etc) have low priced underlay which is ok to fit your self if you can

so deffinately worth shopping around

RICARDO1234

Link to previous thread re saving on carpet fitiing costs:


http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.html?t=520780