We just received all new oak woodwork. It was supposed to be all the same type of oak, but they did the casing in red oak and the baseboards in white oak. Needless to say, it went back. The red oak had a noticeably pink cast to it and the white oak looked yellow/blonde.

we have +50 year old red oak in our house that only has a clear coat on it. it looks golden. we had to repair some flooring when we ripped up old carpets and the new red oak boards do have a pinkish hue. they are laid right next to existing boards and unless you stare at the area you do not notice the difference. It's been almost 4 years and the color is lightening, but like I said you don't notice the difference and the floor is consistent unless you stare.

I'm going though the same thing -- 50 year old red oak in the rest of the house, new red oak in the kitchen. The color match is not good yet -- the new oak is lighter and pinker (the old oak has gone very yellow/orange with age). We're trying to avoid refinishing the old floors too, so the new will hopefully be going darker/yellower to blend better. I've also read that the old oil based poly finishes give an amber tone to the wood (even unstained wood), and the wood/finish will continue to yellow with age. The new water-based finishes do not have the yellow tinge to them and will not amber with age -- so even though both your woods may have been done "natural" the difference in the poly could be what's allowing the pinkness of the new floor to come through.

We have red oak and I believe it's actually called that because of the pink cast. The issue here may be that in order to match the existing floors, a little stain might have been in order before the varnish. Any varnish that isn't water-based will eventually develop a yellow hue - even linseed oil oxidizes over time which is what gives old pine furniture that deep yellowy-gold color.

We were told that hardwood floors typically have three sandings in them. The first is on install, after that you can have two more kicks at the can before you compromise the tongue part of the tongue and groove. You could try experimenting with some stain on the scraps to see if you get a better match to the existing floors, but I know sanding off the varnish is a big undertaking. Short of that, there's really no option but to wait for time to go by, and just how much time is anyone's guess...

The only true way to tell red oak from white oak (there are many species of each) is by looking closely at the grain, especially from an end cut. White oak has longer rays and different ring patterns than red. Some red oak has a pinkish cast but it isn't definitive. Red oak is much more porous than white oak and so may take stain differently.

Our home was built in 1963 and we had the original red oak floors refinished. When we remodeled the kitchen we had Henderson Hardwoods install matching hardwood. They did an awesome job but yes, the newer wood has more of a pinky/orange cast whereas the originals have a golden/orange cast. Mine aren't terribly noticeable though. I would guess that over time they will age and warm up. If your floors look night and day different I'd question the installer. It couln't hurt to call him up and express your concern or simply ask him this same question.
Do you have any pictures?

No pictures yet. I'll try to get some today after he puts on the last coat.

So he did do a light stain on it, but they definitely still read pink, especially up against the existing wood floor in the living room. We had him refinish all of the floors in the bedrooms, which were covered by carpet, and were actually white oak. The floors in the living room were refinished about 5 years ago and are definitely red oak, but don't have any pink hue to them. They have taken on a yellowish tone with the oil based finish. (We think the living room floors must not be original--different wood type, and they run the opposite direction from the bedrooms.) He used water based on the new floors...I'm starting to wish we'd had him refinish the living room, even though it didn't need it, just so they'd at least all have the water-based finish coat.

Nothing to be done at this point but wait and hope it ages well...and maybe have him back in a year to redo the living room.

My husband and I have been living your problem for the last couple weeks. We did a kitchen reno and had to replace a fairly large section of flooring in the area between the kitchen and living room. Our entire place is hardwood (probably original to the house- 1925) so we didn't want to refinish the whole floor. First attempt- applied only a few coats of oil based poly to bare, sanded wood. Floors appeared way too pink/rosy and light, not dark enough and didn't have the yellowish tint that the existing floors had. Next we resanded and experimented with a bunch of different colors of stain. We ended up using a couple different colors- one darker and one lighter. We left one of the coats on for way too long and it took forever to dry. Still wasn't the right color so we were concerned, but once it dried (several days later), we were able to apply more stain to segments of the floor that were still too pink or where we needed variation in color to match the existing floor. The color is looking pretty good- it's not perfect but is not too noticable. After the stain dries, we'll add some coats of oil based poly, which will hopefully darken it a little more and eventually give it that yellowish tint that comes with age. If your floors aren't fixed yet, I can give you the name of the stain colors we used- we tried so many I can't remember which ones we ended up using right now!