We had all of our oak floors sanded and refinished this weekend (the third coat of poly went on Sunday morning). When will the house be habitiable again? The fumes are just overwhelming! All of the windows are open and the fans are on, plus we are using the whole-house fan in the attic to exhaust the air. Still, the house reeks. Everything that was packed away and stored in closed areas of the house (books, clothes, furniature, etc.) has also taken on the scent of polyurethane. It's difficult even to stay in the house for short periods to start cleaning away the huge amounts of dust.

How long will it take for the fumes to disipate? What can we do to speed-up the process and eliminate the sickening odors? Also, how do we clean all of our belongings of the poly aroma? We can't stay at our in-laws' house indefinately, but we also don't want to hurt our asthma and our 5-month-old daughter.

Thanks in advance for any suggestions!

It could be weeks. Don't go in there without a respirator, while it is off gassing.

You will be able to walk on it and move back in, in 7 days, when the finish cure enough to walk on it, and especially start putting furniture back on it(I'd wait longer). No area rugs for at least a month. By then it should be more tollerable.

Don't leave the windows open for too long and let some high humidity inside!! That will do a doosy on the flooring.

I have used OMU (oil modified polyurethane) for over 25 years and most of the major flooring brands stop off gassing real bad in about three days. The fumes start dissipating quickly after that. But we don't know what was used on your floors. And some brands do cure faster than others, allowing the owners to get in sooner. Exchange of air, like your doing, is all that can be done. Some folks are very sensitive to the odor and others don't mind it at all. It will dissipate in time.