A relative has a 1950's home on pillars, peel & stick tile in a large 20'X40' kitchen/dining room. She wants to install wood flooring. I have the pine 6" T&G to give to her, so we don't have to be so conservative with the lumber supply aspect.

Her boys will be doing the work and I'll assist with tools and advise, but I'm not sure of a few things. The old tile is stuck down. Do we have to remove the old tile (too much work!)? I'm thinking no.

We think there is a moisture barrier under the 3/4" ply subfloor. This ply subfloor was laid, 30 yrs ago, over an original 3"-4" pine T&G subfloor. It won't be expensive or difficult to install another moisture barrier, so before we lay it, do we definitely need to remove the old peel & stick tile?

There are a few tiles that are loose, or have loose/lifted edges, and some tiles have chips/parts broken out. We still have a few boxes of the (original installation) tiles, so we can more easily patch these broken/missing areas, before laying the moisture barrier, rather than removing all the tiles, in order to make the floor even, with no dips or voids. Or is this patching not such a good idea? I'm thinking, this patching is a reasonable solution for eliminating the broken/missing tile voids, that would, otherwise, be under the wood flooring.

Thanks for any help.
Sonny