Eh, okay. So, everyone here has some really good suggestions for durability, etc. u/K0rby , you're 100% right with what you say. But, I'll offer a different perspective - u/Sivart67 didn't give us too much info on the purpose here. If you're going to have a 5-year tenant in a building, then just put in the cheap carpet and be done with it. You're probably going to have to replace it in five years again anyways. Yes, the carpet tile - it may be made to last and then you might *not* need to replace it? But that's a bit of a gamble, and the OP seemed to be asking about the cheapest option. As for timelines and supply, etc - surprisingly enough, we've looked at using Home Depot in the past with their carpet and installation options. Sometimes they were the cheapest by far. In the old days, I've even gotten my flatbed trailer and gone to the local Home Depot and gotten rolls of carpet that I installed by myself in one evening. It's not that difficult (use the mastic tape - works wonders but don't accidentally get that stuff stuck to your face!). Installing carpet is pretty easy and straightforward and hands down the way cheapest option. Hope this helps... More on reddit.com

My wife and I carpeted our garage with these carpet tiles from Mitre10. We went to a few stores like Bunnings, Mitre10 and specialised Belgotex and decided that while all of them are very similar in price, but the ones with cushion backing feel better, at least on concrete. I'd also done quite a bit of research at the time and most of it claimed that 50cm tiles are actually easier to install when it comes down to cutting it for tricky places. Overall installation took a couple of days in a 25sqm space, add to that waterproofing membrane we had to add because of concrete and something called negative pressure sucking moisture up (I think that's what it's called). To fix tiles in place we just used this carpet glue, which isn't really a glue but more a thing that makes it tacky, you can remove the tiles quite easily later. Ah, about commercial tiles, from the dude at Belgotex I understood that they mostly have more colour options and in some cases more heavy duty tiles that Bunnings/Mitre10, but pretty much any tiles will last a very long time in a residential setting, all of them are created quite heavy duty. Overall I reckon it's very DIY friendly if you want to save money, though it does give you that more of an office/commercial vibe. A few photos how it looks: Process - https://imgur.com/NpbIb0D Little staircase - https://imgur.com/cDgU0j3 Fully done with skirting - https://imgur.com/Um4cY58 Hope that helps. More on reddit.com