Wood Deck Installation & Replacement

Add curb appeal to your home with a Wood Deck!

There are few more sought after features for a luxurious backyard than a finely built, spacious deck. They’re the perfect spot for outdoor entertaining, add substantial value to the home (offering around an 80% ROI), and are a beautiful feature for the house when built well.

Despite the emerging popularity of composite and other synthetic decking types, the ROI for these is about 68%, and the look and feel is often a turn off to potential buyers. All in all, wood makes a far more valuable and cost-effective building material than others on the market. However, the type of wood that is chosen is a hugely important choice.

What is the best decking material for your home?

The first decision to be made is whether the deck will be built with hardwood, softwood, or pressure-treated wood.

• Hardwood- come from slow-growing, broad-leaved tree species such as Teak, Cherry and Oak. Hardwood varieties typically outperform softwood varieties when it comes to weather resistance, durability, and longevity. However, these perks come with a significantly higher price tag.

• Softwood- a category of faster-growing trees, such as evergreens and conifers, like Pine and Cedar trees. To help keep softwoods from rotting, they are typically treated with preservative chemicals, but are still a more economical choice as they are sourced from quick-growing trees, and can have decent longevity with proper maintenance.
• Pressure Treated Woods- one of the most popular decking materials on the market, this decking is typically made using softwoods that have undergone a chemical preservation process to help make the material more resistant to pests and the elements. This treatment process makes the wood more suitable for a variety of applications and is often chosen for its strength and relatively low cost. Despite all these positives, this material has high maintenance requirements, needing power washing, staining and sealing biannually. This type of decking is also notorious for aging poorly, resulting in shrunken boards and splinters, which could cause infections due to the chemical additives in the wood.

Of course, there are only too many different wood types to choose from, each with their own pros and cons. An experienced decking contractor can help narrow down the choices, and help explain wood grades, their specific characteristics and what will make for the best deck for you and your home!