I have hardwood floors, and big dogs. After 15 years, my floors have a lot of scratches, but not from the dogs. I trim their nails at least once a week - or whenever I can hear them clickity-clack on the floor.

I'm not sure engineered hardwood would be any more moisture-resistant than laminate. Where is the moisture coming from, and how can you solve that problem? Get rid of the moisture, and you can use whatever flooring you like.

I have one 75 pound dog and after six years our Bruce engineered hardwood floors look absolutely awful. Of all the home improvements we've done over the years, engineered hardwood is our greatest regret.

We installed it as floating. The edges of the planks are worn and chipped; worn in a high traffic area at bottom of stairs and chipped because I think his claws get caught on the grooves between planks? If you look at the floor at the proper angle you can see moisture around the sink, dishwasher, and fridge water dispenser has caused some wrinkling.

In our new house that we're renovating, it'll be laminate or vinyl wood-look floors. My friends have site-finished hardwoods and those look great and stand up to kids and pets, but engineered hardwood? I strongly advise against it.

I love the new tile that looks like wood. Put some throw rugs on it. The potential buyers may like the durability. It might be pricey though.

Consider staining the concrete slab instead of painting!

We have the original, nailed down wood flooring and have always had large dogs (> 100 lbs). I'm not very good about trimming nails (but I should be more diligent). Overall, thru the years, no scratching from dogs, more from debris from outside. About 20 years ago, we had 1st floor refinished and poly'd. Will have refinished after a remodel completed, but more because of a water stain than dog's nails.

I don't know much about engineered flooring. Is it poly finished? That might be the difference

I realize that you're probably done with this thread, but I wanted to add a suggestion.

We have two dogs and have decided to go with strand bamboo. It's amazingly hard. I hit the sample board with a hammer to test the hardness. Plus, the color was achieved by cooking the wood, so the color goes all the way through. If the dogs manage to scratch it, we won't need to touch up the color.

Bamboo is also problematic.

Scratching problems can also be a finish issue.

Fake floors are not worth it. Good old fashioned wood wears better, acquires patina not damage and can be refinished if necessary. And it doesn't look or sound cheap under foot.

This post was edited by snookums2 on Tue, Mar 18, 14 at 17:14

Why not paint the slab and save the money to install flooring right before putting it on the market? (Or sooner if you hate the slab.)