Can you take one or two clear digital photos and post it? With an oil based finish or sealer (and not stained), red oak is generally amber to orange-reddish in tone, whereas white oak is more tan to golden brown. With a water based finish, both species will be much lighter or whitish, but the basic color tones will still be there. Red oak generally has a thicker or wider earlywood cell layer (the rings you see), whereas the white oak earlywood layer is usually very narrow in width. This is most easily visible on the end of a board or with rift and quartered. When looking down on flatsawn flooring, both species rings can appear wide. White oak has rays (the cells that are perpendicular to the rings) that are longer (1-2 inches) and are very noticeable as wide ray fleck in 90 degree quartered material. Red oak rays are short (1/2" - 1" long), but can be easily seen due to the lighter colored wheat or amber red oak wood and the generally wider annual growth rings. This flooring company has some good pictures of both red and white oak with an oil based finsih: Here is a link that might be useful: Launstein oak pictures

White Oak is KNOWN for tannin bleed. That's when the orangey-yellow tones in the wood pull to the surface when a WATER based finish is used. This is unavoidable unless you use a sealant. Something like Bona Nordic Seal will do TWO THINGS: It will offer a slightly silver colour while SEALING the White Oak. You can then top this with 3 coats of Bona Traffic HD for one of the toughest floors in industry. To compare costs of product ALONE: Minwax stains = $20/quart (covers 150sf; or 600sf per gallon) Bona Traffic HD = $130+ gallon (covers 400 - 500sf per gallon) Bona Nordic Seal = $80+ per gallon (covers about 400sf) Minwax Finish = $40/gallon (covers 500sf/gallon) Notice the Bona Traffic is 4 TIMES more expensiv than Minwax??? Cost for the 'guy' to get the training = $$$ Cost for the builder to get this WRONG = thousands and thousands of dollars (which you have to FIGHT him/her for!!!) It is CHEAPER for the Builder to send his 'guy' to the Bona factory to take the three day course than it is to have his 'guy' mess this up! I am NOT kidding about that. And I would argue the builder's statement "...should be able to handle a water based system...". Sigh. I've seen it over and over and over again. Oil based guys (especially if they are 'old-timers') have a HARD time figuring out Water based. I actually had one 'finisher' who believed he had been using 'water based' finishes for the last 20 years. His reasoning? Because the stuff coming out of the can was 'liquid'. He thought that meant 'water'. Yep. It has happened. It will happen again. And it will continue to happen until water based is the ONLY option. Ask your builder if you can out-source the finishing of the wood floors - with credit going to your budget because he doesn't have to deal with the costs. I doubt it. They make WAY too much money on the mark-up for flooring...but you can try.

@User Thank you for your input. I have a veteran cabinet maker, two more projects until he retires. I cannot change cabinet guy at this point. What are your initial thoughts for me? Different wood? Paint? Start all over?

I ended up going with special walnut. One coat with a satin water based poly (not shiny). We love it. After the floor stainer put samples down of the lighter colors it really did look pink. I feared having my whole house “being ruined” so I went with the “safer” color and I couldn’t be happier. Someone gave me the advice that most of your hardwood floors will be eventually covered by area rugs anyways so no need to stress! The picture was taken at night with overhead lighting on. Not the best time to take a photo but you get the idea! Good luck!!!