I had old hardwood floors refinished in my new home I just purchased (downstairs is oak, upstairs wood is fir). I was going to have them refinished by a professional floor refinisher, but I decided to let my general contractor do it after a little bit of begging on his end. (I'm a young woman - this entire experience is new to me, so I'm making some mistakes).

Well, everything was going well until the end. He filled in all of the holes and cracks with wood putty, and smeared the putty all around those areas too (and didn't remove it). I'm pretty sure he did not put any poly over those spots. Now those spots are discolored and look pretty bad. I don't know what to do, and he doesn't know what to do. I'm not angry with him, I just want the problem fixed. It was a mistake, and simply needs corrected. We have not touched those spots yet, until we figure out a solution first.

Can someone please give us both advice on what to do? I'd like to not have a different company come in a fix it, since I've pretty much maxed out my budget for this house. So, if I we can do this ourselves, that would be great.

Do I have him sand those spots down, re-stain those spots, and then do the layers of polyurethane? (he used Minwax dark walnut stain, and 2 coats of the Minwax high build semi-gloss oil poly).

If you say that i have to refinish the entire floors again - I will cry for a very long time.

Thank you for your help in advance!

Can you post a picture of what he did ?

if he didnt put any poly over it, he can hand sand all the effected areas to remove residue, thenscreen floors and recoat..if he put poly over it...the floors will need to be redone most likely...