When shopping for carpet it is a good idea to measure the areas being covered to get an approximate amount of yardage that will be required before you go to the carpeting store.  It would also be beneficial to carry a rough sketch of the floor plan of the rooms. Include locations of doorways, windows and most likely furniture placement in this sketch. All these factors can influence seam placement and can have a profound affect on the amount of yardage necessary to complete the job.

Estimating your yardage-

Step 1: Make a rough sketch of the rooms you want to get carpeted.

Step 2: Measure the longest distance in each dimension of the rooms to be carpeted (i.e. the widest point in the width of the room and the longest point in the length of the room).  This includes going into doorways or other setbacks that may not be directly across from each other on opposing walls.  Mark these measurements on your drawing.

Step 3: On a separate sheet of paper list the room measurements and then convert them into decimals, for example 11 feet 9 inches equals 11.75 feet

Hint: To make this conversion take the inches, in our example 9, and divide by 12 (number of inches in a foot) to get .75.  Add your foot measurement and you get 11.75.

Step 4: Multiply the length by the width of each area and this will give you the square footage of each room.

Step 5: Add the square footage for each room together and divide that total by 9 (the number of square feet in a square yard) this will give you the square yardage.  This conversion is needed because carpeting is sold by the square yard not the square foot.

Step 6: Since carpet comes in rolls cutting and seaming are necessary and creates waste. An additional 5-10% should be added to the total square yardage calculated to allow for this.  This is done by multiplying the square yardage figure you came up with for your rooms by 5-10% and adding the resulting percentage to the previous total to get your yardage + wastage total.

Now you have an approximate number of square yards on which a budget or cost estimate can be based.

     Prior to the final contract the carpet dealer will send out a professional estimator to accurately calculate the yardage necessary to complete your job. Before signing the contract be sure that you understand all terms and conditions and that you understand the planned installation layout. The estimator will make a scale drawing of the areas to be carpeted and will mark seam placement and grain directions on the drawing.