Can’t afford to carpet my council house

Carpet right have cheap carpets and if they are square rooms it's actually fairly easy to fit them yourself. Their underlay and gripper rods are expensive so source them elsewhere
You might find offcuts are ok for your rooms too and can work out cheaper.

We have typically paid £100-300 per room depending on the size for carpet £50 for underlay. Pick a room at a time. Vinyl can be a cheap way of flooring hallways, kitchens and bathrooms and is fairly easy to fit if there aren't too many fiddly bits. We did our utility room for less than £100

A family friend moved out of her council house a couple of years ago and had to remove all the carpets before she left. She was horrified.

Have you watched grand designs at all? People pay a fortune for polished concrete floors and they have children.

Dunelm have very large rugs 200 x 290 cm from under £100 , if you could run to a couple of those for some rooms .

SHEIN has rugs from 2.80 - they are quite nice and would work on your sealed concrete floor until such time as you can carpet. Definitely seal the floors though, as PP have suggested

We had some carpet fitted recently by a family run company, not a chain, and the fitter was telling me they have rolls and piles of offcuts, even large bits that they give away of facebook every so often. Maybe find a local company to you and ask if they have good sized offcuts they'd be willing to give you for free if you just pay for fitting.

Rugs, remnants would suffice. Look on marketplace, gumtree etc. Bank Holiday weekend will see people doing DIY so keep your eyes peeled.

Don't be afraid to ask family and friends either.

Also do it bit by bit, one room at a time, starting with the rooms you spend most time in

I would do room by room with carpet tiles. I was fortunate enough to have council housing when I was younger and the carpet was stained with blood and had fleas. The council weren’t very helpful with dealing with that either…

fleas were much worse to keep under control despite no pets. My baby kept get bitten and it was a very stressful time.

So I think dust is favourable. Try carpet tiles :) one room at a time….

Can you find out if there are any local charities which would help you? There is one in my area who would give you a grant in these circumstances.

What a ridiculous waste!

Putting fitted carpet throughout the house is probably the most expensivd way to cover floors

Cheaper ways:

• look for freecycle or 2nd hand
• look for offcuts

• carpet tiles - b& q etc.

I've seen stick on floor tiles...my friend used them. They looked pretty good. Sorry no idea how you attach them or if you can do it straight onto the concrete or what...but I'm sure there's some tutorials on YouTube

My sister viewed a council house and it had laminate all downstairs and grey carpet upstairs, it was in such good condition she asked the officer if she could keep it. They said yes but she had to sign some stuff to say she was happy with the condition of it and would take personal responsibilty of any damage. Well when she moved in the whole lot had been ripped up 🤦🏻‍♀️

My first thought with concrete floors is can you 'finish' them in some way? Some people have concrete floor so there must be some kind of product that seals them. Might be a cheap option for downstairs for now. Then some cheap rugs if you need

Get precise measurements for all rooms. Shop around at smaller carpet fitters. Ask for off cuts for smaller rooms especially. Priorities what rooms need doing first and don't do them all at once

I bought carpet tiles when I had a council property as I was in a similar position to you. I dont know how much they are nowadays but were very cheap back then ( 8 years ago )

I'm honestly stunned. Two family members have been allocated two shocking council houses so i knew they didnt come done up or anything and could be absysmal but I wasn't some just don't have something so basic. Eye opening and embarrassed I wasn't aware.

I cannot believe that they can both give you houses without carpet and allow tenants to do their own decoration and remove the flooring too. All the decoration should be done by the organisation you are leasing it from. If they are going to leave bare concrete floors, then they need polish and seal them so they are properly finished.

Yup. It's standard. I don't know why they can't put even some cheap laminate down but 🤷.

I'd have been happy to have had the cost added to my weekly rent until the cost of flooring had been repaid but apparently they won't do that.

Seal the floors then room by room as you can. I've just had a look on FB and there's loads of carpet for £10-30 for a room sized piece.

Enjoy your lovely new home.

I'd join local FB groups. We have a fantastic organisation locally who help with things like this. Maybe you do too? The other temporary option is garden rugs. You can buy massive ones really cheaply. B&M and Home Bargains sell them. Will be ok for the summer. I have used them temporarily. Congratulations on your new home

When I was a kid, my Dad once went to a carpet shop and got all the old sample books of carpeting they had and used them as carpet tiles in our hall.

Definitely use concrete sealer in the short term. Not expensive but very effective at stopping the dust and very easy to apply.

Try a local auction house. I got a huge roll of top quality carpet for £40 which did a bedroom

Garage floor paint is brilliant. We lived for quite some time with this on our concreted floor until we were in a position to lay proper flooring.

Then off cuts from the carpet shop - even if they don’t go wall to wall, just rug size would work.

I bought my carpet from Ebay, I have quite a big sitting room & it cost me £70 all in & I fitted it myself. Is this affordable to you? If not could you look at vinyl? At least for now it could work. Unsure where you live but most areas have charities who can help with things like this. Congratulations on your new home I'm sure in time it will be lovely and cosy.