Screen and Recoat in Winnipeg
If your floors look dull or lightly scratched but the wood underneath is sound, a screen and recoat is usually all you need, and it is the cheapest way to make them look new again.
What a recoat vs full refinish actually means
A screen and recoat is a light job. We scuff the existing finish with an abrasive screen so a fresh coat will grip, clean everything down, and roll on one or two new coats of finish. The wood itself is never sanded to bare timber. That is why it is faster, cheaper, and far less dusty than a full refinish, and why it is usually a one-day job rather than a week.
The catch is that a recoat only refreshes the layer on top. If wear has gone through the old finish and into the wood, or there are dark stains and gouges in the timber itself, new coats will just seal that in under a fresh shine. That is the point where a full sand-back is the honest answer, and we will say so rather than sell you the cheaper job twice.
How to tell if a recoat is enough
Look for dullness, fine surface scratches, and traffic paths that have lost their sheen but not their colour. If the floor still reads as one even tone with no bare wood showing, a recoat will likely do. A drop of water on a worn spot is the quick home test: if it beads and sits there, the finish is still protecting the wood and a recoat will hold. If it soaks in and darkens the board within a minute or two, the finish is gone and you are into a full refinish.
Winnipeg gives you one more thing to check that a milder climate would not. Between a forced-air furnace running through a minus thirty January and a humid July, indoor humidity in a Winnipeg house can swing across most of the usable range in a single year, and hardwood moves with it. If your boards have opened up visible gaps in winter and closed them again by August, that is normal seasonal movement rather than damage, and it does not by itself push you toward a sand-back. What does push you there is finish that has failed at the board edges, which is where the movement stresses it first.
On maple, which turns up under a lot of Winnipeg carpet, a recoat is often the smarter call for a second reason. Maple is dense and closed-grain, so it sands to a beautiful surface but shows every mistake, and each full sand-back spends wear layer you cannot get back. If the finish is the only thing that has failed, we would rather recoat it and leave the wood for a refinish you actually need in fifteen years.
Have us look at your floors in person.