"HeyBub" wrote in message
news
RogerT wrote:
As noted elsewhere, I am re-doing a second floor apartment that a
tenant just moved out of.

Unfortunately, the previous tenant had cats and there are cat urine
stains everywhere on the existing old hardwood floors. There were
rugs on top of the old hardwood floors, but the urine stains went
through the rugs to the hardwood floors. So, barring some miracle
way of getting rid of lots of cat urine stains and smell, it looks
like I am going to have to rip up the existing old hardwood floors to
get rid of the smell.
If I go that route, I want to put new 3/4-inch hardwood down -- not
Pergo, laminate, vinyl, etc.

My questions are related to what type of hardwood to get.

I was thinking of maybe putting down pre-finished 3/4-inch hardwood
-- such as Bruce prefinished hardwood. But, my concern about that is
that the prefinished "colors" are apparently a stain and finish -- so
if the floor gets scratched or damaged in the future (hopefully not
by cat urine), I would need to sand out the damaged area and then
have to figure out how to match the stain so the color would match.
Instead, I was wondering if there is some particular type of finished
or unfinished hardwood floor that would look good with just a clear
polyurethane finish. That way, to repair any damage, I could sand it
out and apply a clear finish again and hopefully that would match the
original finish.
If I go with that approach, is there any particular type of hardwood
flooring that I should consider getting -- oak, maple, something
else? -- either finished or unfinished?

Before you go to the expense (but for anyone who spends $5,000 on a floor
for a rental unit is probably not concerned with expense), try renting an
ozone generator. A powerful one.

I did think about renting an ozone generator, but there are two reasons why
I probably won't end up doing that.

One is that the apartment below this one is occupied. And, my understanding
is that ozone generators need to run for a few days to work, but that the
ozone is hazardous to people -- so the place has to be empty while the ozone
generator is on. Even though this is a separate apartment, I think the
ozone generator operating in the floor above could present a risk to the
occupants of the apartment below.

And, the second reason is that from what I understand about cat urine
smells, the problem is not just one of removing the existing odor. The
problem is that the residual cat urine is a bacteria (or something like
that) that regrows in humid weather and produces more odor. So, unless the
ozone generator kills and removes the bacteria(?), the odor will return.