I just visited my cousin and her family over the past weekend. When they built their house 30+ years ago they couldn’t afford the extra $1,000 that it would have cost them to put in hardwood floors, and they certainly had no money for carpeting. But they did have a lot of wood on the property, so…
They cut down some of the larger pine trees that they had, milled the lumber themselves (it was farm property, and they had the machinery) and put in softwood floors. Since then they’ve had a succession of growing boys, dogs and cats of all size and disposition (including the present dog, who’s half my weight) and a lot of scratches, grooves, chips and nicks in the floor.
Total country charm. I wish I had softwood floors now.