We are in the design phases for our retirement home and now working on flooring options for the main body of the house. We have 4 dogs which overall present the biggest challenge. Keeping nails trimmed, and the occasional accident.....

Our current home has hardwoods (red oak) downstairs and carpet/tile upstairs. In next home there will be no carpet. Bathrooms will be tile. Rest of flooring is less certain.

Options include.... prefinished bamboo......... faux wood tile........ and normal unfinished hardwoods such as we have now just not oak (something more like Brazilian Cherry, teak, etc). The current floors were stained with minwax stain and 3 coats of Bona Traffic. We have not topcoated and the current finish is about 10 years old. And the Bona is about shot.

Frequent topcoating when you have multiple dogs, large at that and one of whom is a medical alert dog .. is difficult. If we go with hardwoods again, what are the best overall finishing options for longevity, water resistance, and not being super slippery?

I have been reading about the Swedish finishes (we live in NC so do not think we have an excess of regulations stacked against us). I am not displeased with Bona but its longevity has not been there.

Going with faux wood tile has about a 0.09% chance of happening. Spousal unit is not leaning that way and I am not either. higher cost, and tile is even more loud than hardwoods. Going with prefinished Bamboo offers some options.. esp if we can free float it. Just buy some extra wood upfront and change out any future disasters. Just not feeling it as much as regular hardwaoods save for the need to refinish/topcoat. Thx in advance for any feedback!

If you can find Hickory or Black Locust, these may be the hardest wood available domestically, then coat with moisture curing poly-urethane, I think this may be your best option. A film type finish will be easiest to maintain, The MC poly has a tile like glaze and is extremely wear resistant if available. Brazilian cherry is very hard, too.
Plan on coating your floor every 5-10 years and you will not need to sand to bare wood and refinish. With hard wear, you should plan on two coats when you re-coat.
Animals can bring grit into the house on their paws.
Bamboo dents easily, strand bamboo is super hard, though.

Thx Pete,

I had just found the moisture curing poly earlier tonight. I have Bona Traffic down on our stairs and it is holding nicely there. The main floor, however, it did not last long. That said I also have no idea what products my spousal unit has used when she buffs the floors. That could also be part of the culprit!

The irony is scratches do not bother me much but then we do not have anything significant. One of our rescues did mess up a few areas via urine and I had to locally sand and restain/finish those. But overall the downstairs poly is simply mostly gone. I will add it to my list to ensure she is not using anything that could harm the floors no matter what the product labels say (she is usually into no chemical natural products though I always tell her Arsenic is natural and...... )

I'll add the moisture curing products to the list as well as the woods mentioned in your reply!