Trying to upload photos..

It's fine to have the stair wood different from the second floor--steps usually have bigger chunks of wood and look different anyway, plus you'll have a runner. Historically it was pretty common to have a totally different species of wood on the second floor since company didn't go up there and you could save money that way. Just don't go too weird. Keep it in the same color family. :)

I'd go with something between the current color and the unstained color, whatever you prefer in that range. That leaves you with neutral and--dare I say it?--timeless. Because that's the color range these floors have always defaulted to.

Your floor pro can match the new floor to the old of course.

Just don't go gray in the new finish.

Yes, just stop at the top of the stairs.

@palimpsest do you mean the top of the actual stairs or the hall at the top of the stairs?

I think you could stop at the last step/riser before the second floor landing with the downstairs stain color.

@dan1888 all of our second floor is red oak HW. The whole house is the color at the top of the stairs but the second floor was semi recently refinished. Downstairs the kitchen is unfinished red oak (new) and the other floors are worn and needing refinishing. I think we are going to aim for something with less red but still some red undertones. The stairs will have a new runner at some point.

I think a traditional color would look best in our house the more I think about it. Our kitchen will be fairly simple and (I hope) "classic" in design. White or off white cabinets like my above photo with a neutral wall color and black counters (honed granite).

Traditionally many floors were finished with an oil based product. That adds a warm yellow cast to most woods for light to medium tones. Water based urethanes go on clear also. But many products don't add the yellow tinge to the floor. This capability is why you see many current floor color choices show wood in colors much closer to how they appear unfinished. I think this will only accelerate going forward.

I’m wondering why one would go for an oil vs water base or vice versa? I’ll have to look into that.

We had the EXACT same dilemma. When we purchased it, the whole downstairs of our home was beautiful red oak harwood floowing and the whole second floor was dated aqua wall to wall carpet. We replaced the second floor with engineered red oak and it matched beautifully.Very sturdy and easy care. I love it! Maybe take a look?

@lawsonch19 how did you match it?

I think we’re leaning towards natural now…