Basement & Interior Floor Coatings, Collingwood

A coated basement slab is a genuinely good answer for a chalet or a family house near the bay: it is warmer underfoot than tile, it takes ski boots and wet dogs, and unlike carpet or laminate it does not become a write-off the one time water gets in.

That last point is the real argument in this area. If a basement takes water, a coated slab is mopped and dried. Carpet, underlay and laminate go to the curb, and anything organic that stayed damp for two days is a mould conversation.

Moisture first, and it may be a no

Basement slabs are the highest-risk substrate we work on, for the same reason they are attractive to coat: they are below grade, in contact with soil, often poured before under-slab vapour barriers were routine. We will test, and sometimes the answer is that a sealed coating is the wrong product for that floor until the water is dealt with.

If your basement has taken water more than once, the sequence is drainage first, coating second. A coating over an active water problem hides it for a season and then fails, and you have paid for the coating twice.

Odour and occupancy

Interior work uses low-odour formulations and we ventilate mechanically, but a polyaspartic top coat still has a working period you do not want to be in the house for if anyone is sensitive. Plan on being out for the day. By evening it is walkable and the smell is essentially gone — which, for a job in a lived-in house, is the main practical advantage over epoxy, where you are managing that for several days.