Reflooring a wooden deck can be cheaper and easier than you may think. You just need to be on the lookout for the right materials and be willing to spend a weekend dedicated to the project, but anyone can do it much less expensive than you can hire it done.
Our son’s deck was in very bad shape. He had rotten wood, water damage in other areas, and some of the planking had come loose. It was actually dangerous to walk on it. However, having 3 small children and a full-time job, he didn’t feel like he had the time or money to fix it.
My husband told him that he could show him how to fix it and that we thought that we could find the materials much cheaper. However, the biggest problem was that it was not safe for them or the children. So he agreed to fix it. Below is the steps we followed.
Measure your Wooden Deck for Materials
My husband can fix almost anything but is no longer able to do all the physical work. We started hunting for a way to fix his deck quickly and easily. Our first step was to measure his deck. It was 20 feet long and 10 feet wide. Then, we had to figure out how many planks we would need to cover that space. Therefore, we knew by simple math (multiply the 20 X 10) that we needed to cover the area of 200 feet.
However, it is not as easy as that sounds! You have to consider the width of the planks and the length of the planks. We knew that the planks were approximately 6 inches wide so it would take 2 planks for every foot to cover the 10 feet wide. You also have to add a couple of planks because the width of the wood is always a little less than the actual six inches. Then, we knew that we would also need 20 feet of planking in length for each row to cover the length of the 20 feet. Of course, the number of planks needed would vary on the length of the planks.
How to find Cheaper Materials
I started looking on Facebook Marketplace for materials. There were many choices on there. However, I found some (usually very expensive) decking composite that someone had leftover from a job that he had completed. The composite will also last much longer than a wooden deck. He had the planks listed at $1.75 per foot. I emailed him and asked how long the planks were and he said that most were 5-6 feet. We had to figure out then how many planks we would need. We knew that at 5 feet it would take 4 for each row to get to the 20 feet so we would need 40 (20 X 2) planks.
We met with the man and decided to buy 42 planks thinking that we would have a little extra. He sold them to us for a total of $330 since we bought so many.
Another purchase that we had to make was decking screws which cost about $25 at our local hardware store.
Demolition of Old Wooden Deck Flooring
After purchasing the flooring, the old decking had to be removed. My husband showed our son how to remove the old planks by using a hammer, but you could use a pry bar. His flooring was easy to remove because the person had nailed down the floor. Typically, the deck is screwed down. If so, you would probably want to use a rechargeable drill to remove the screws.
Check Remaining Structure of the Deck
Next, you need to check the floor joists to make sure that they are not damaged or rotten. Even though the joists were discolored in places where the rain had gone through, they were still strong and useable.
Add planks to the joists
The next step was to lay out the planks on the joists. Since they were different lengths, we wanted to lay them in a more brick style pattern so it would not be easily recognizable where one plank ended and another one began. You also need to offset your planks so that you are not screwing all your planks in the same joists as that weakens the joists. Due to us having shorter planks than normal, we also had to add 3 two joists ($40) which would only be needed if you have shorter planks.
Once the planks were laid out properly, our son screwed the planks down. We did run into a slight problem as we did not purchase enough planks since we were having to do the brick pattern. That meant that we had to saw off the pieces on the edge so we had to go to our hardware store and purchase 2 16 foot planks and 1 8 foot plank for $62. What a big difference in price! Due to the lumber shortage, they were out of the color and told my son that it could be several months so he just decided to use a coordinating color to go on the edge of the deck and then stain his railing to match the coordinating color.
Completing the Project
Once you have screwed down all the boards, you would be finished. However, our son decided that he wanted to stain his railing to match with the coordinating color of the deck so he bought a gallon of stain for
Cost Breakdown
| Item | Cost | Place Purchased | Necessary |
| 42 5-6 planks | $330 | FB Marketplace | X |
| Decking Screws | $25 | Lowes | X |
| 3 planks | $62 | Lowes | |
| 3 floor joists | $40 | Lowes | X |
| Gallon of stain | $38 | Lowes | |
| Total | $495 |
Our son was able to replace his wooden deck for under $500 with much better materials and finish it in a weekend. It would have been even less if he would have bought a few more planks from Facebook Marketplace. We thought that was a very good price for the size of his deck!