Out and About: Floors can be winning or wanting

In my years as a real estate broker, I naturally ask buyers what is important to them in their new home.

A great kitchen?  Proximity to a subway?  Central air conditioning?  A doorman?

Floor in new development.

The responses vary, but not once has a prospective buyer suggested to me that good flooring was essential.

Yet floors can be the, uh, foundation of the emotional response buyers have when they enter an apartment.  The type and condition of the flooring may well make the difference between a sale and a search that continues.

Tastes vary when it comes to floors, and just as kitchen styles have evolved, so have floors.  There was a time when