How to Figure or Calculate Floor Covering Amounts to buy

Measure the room or rooms for the new floor covering. Use a long enough measuring tape to reach across the longest length of each room and measure to nearest inch. Don't take off for bookcases or fireplace hearths that extend into the room because sheet goods such as carpeting, linoleum floor covering, and vinyl floor covering will be cut to fit around them. Measure the length and the width of any rectangular or square room and if the room is oddly shaped, break it down into separate square or rectangular areas. Figure the length and width of each separate area of any oddly shaped room.

Make drawings of each room showing the length and width measurements of each, if several rooms are going to have floor covering installed. Making diagrams will help cut out having to remeasure later and will be useful when shopping for the floor covering. Mark where the doorways are, to show how traffic flows through the room. In larger rooms, seaming of floor coverings such as vinyl sheet goods is often necessary and knowing about the traffic flow may help in deciding where these seams should be placed. Floor coverings usually extend into doorways a few inches so more length is called for in these areas.

Calculate the square footage of each room by multiplying the length times the width. Change inch amounts into fractional parts of a foot before multiplying. For example if the room measures 15 foot, 3 1/2 inches long, by 10 foot 8 1/4 inches wide, first round up to the nearest inch to get 15 ft. 4 inch by 10 ft. 9 inches. Next change the inches to fractional parts of a foot to get: 4 inches equals 4/12 or 1/3 of a foot, and 9 inches equals 9/12 or 3/4 of a foot. Now multiply 15 1/3 time 10 3/4 to get 164 10/12 square feet which rounds up to 165 square feet. Square footage can be used when buying floor coverings that come in smaller sections such as floor tiles, hardwood flooring, laminate flooring, bamboo flooring, cork flooring and vinyl squares. Remember to figure on buying at least 10 percent over the amount of the room's square footage to allow for matching patterns and wastage.

Check the width of any floor covering to be used that comes as rolled goods such as carpeting, linoleum floor covering, and vinyl floor covering. The width of the sheet goods and the size of the room they are going in, will determine how much of the covering has to be bought and how much waste there will be. Say the room is 13 foot wide by 16 ft long and the floor covering comes in 12 foot widths. Running the covering across the width will mean two 16 foot long runs with a seam one foot from the side wall, for a total length of 32 feet of the 12 ft. material. If ran down the length of the room, two 13 foot runs will be needed with a seam some 4 foot from a long wall, for a total length of 26 ft. of the floor covering. In both cases large amounts of the material will be left over, so in this case a floor covering not sold in rolls may be a better idea. For larger rooms, shop for floor coverings that comes in widths that will work with the room size to give less waste and lower costs. Common widths for roll goods are 10, 12, 16, and 18 feet, with some being hard to find at most floor covering stores. When shopping for the floor covering take the room diagrams made earlier to be able to compare how different products will work in the room. Don't forget about matching patterns. Floor coverings with little or no noticeable patterns will mean less waste and more savings. More material will be needed if noticeable patterns are present as pieces will have to be lined up to have those patterns match up on each floor covering piece.
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