Hardwood floor problem: uneven subfloor?

Question

We are currently having our floors refinished before moving into our new ( 1952 built) home. We found after lifting the carpet in the dining room that there was an addition there, and the hardwoods only went half way into the room ( leaving about 90sq ft not finished). After inspection, the subfloor in this area sat too high, so we couldn't interlace new floors with the old. As a result we would have to cut out the old floor in that room and lay down new floor that would be 1/2" higher than the rest of the house.... we did not do this.

My question: Is it possible to take 1/2" off the floor joists so that the sub floor would match the rest of the house and we could then complete the rest of the floor on the same level? Would we need to reinforce each joist to make this possible? We haven't inspected the floor joists yet, but will do that soon.

thanks,

B

Answer 1

Let me just say that anything is possible.

I'm trying to picture the floor and your intended project. If you can get to the joists and can take off I/2 inch then that would be the thing to do.

They only thing is: Isn't the floor nailed to the joists? If so, that might be tricky because you will have to pull up the floor anyway.

Answer 2

I had the same problem this spring ,

We ripped up all flooring to the sub floor and then we thought we were done but then we found out there was 2 layers of sub/ flooring( when the installers showed up to do the Job)  so we ripped up another 5/8" of plywood 740sq/ft in 1 night ) and then the floors matched the only other thing you can do is see if the MFG of the new flooring makes reducers it will slop down to the old flooring I did not like that they look like small ramps .