Real Estate Show Jennifer Fleener with Lipperts Carpet

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Real Estate Show Jennifer Fleener Liperts Carpet One

Alice Lema: [00:00:00] Well, Hey, there's Southern Oregon. Welcome back to the real estate show. So happy you could join us again. I'm Alice Lema, your host of the real estate show. I'm a broker here in Southern Oregon with John Scott real estate. And today we're gonna get some sneak peaks into what's coming down the pike with colors, design materials, all those kind of trendy things that we're all watching online and on those TV shows Jennifer Fleener of Liperts. She's the inhouse designer of Lipperts. Jennifer's gonna be joining us today to kind of give us a clue about if any changes are coming with materials and colors or design or not.

And it's great. Information, whether you're building something new remodeling or just refreshing, or you're just curious about what's coming down the pike next. So super excited to have Jennifer on the show. She comes on the show every so often kind of straighten us out about what to do and not to do and make our house look good, feel good and function. So stay tuned for that interview with Jennifer [00:01:00] Fleener of Lipperts.

In the meantime, let's talk briefly about what's going on in our local market. Southern Oregon housing market is still chugging along. We're getting quite a few more listings. In fact just in the last week in the single family home in just the residential market in Jackson county, we have 59% more listings than we did this time last year in Jackson county. Last year we had 551 listings. Now we have 877. So 59% increase in Jackson county listings.

From this time last year, Josephine county 52% more listings. From this time last year Josephine county last year had 248 listings on the market. And this year Josephine county has 378 listings. So that's a 52% increase in Josephine county of listings on the market from this time last year. But don't let those numbers fool you or scare you. [00:02:00] We still have a smidge, more buyers than sellers. So listen up folks. Who knows what's coming down the pike for the rest of the year or next year.

If you ever thought about selling I'm in the camp, let's do it now. Well we kind of have our heads around what the market's doing or not doing, but whether you're buying, selling, or investing, that's what's going on in our local market. So we're gonna take a quick break with words from our sponsor.

We're so grateful to John L. Scott here in Ashland, Medford, Guy Giles of Churchill Mortgage, and our local Rogue Valley Association of Realtors for sponsoring the show. It's why we can bring this to you every week. So stay tuned for our interview with Jennifer Fleener, the in-house designer of Lipperts here locally in Medford, she's a wealth of knowledge. You don't wanna miss a word which she has to say. It might be something you were expecting. So don't touch that dial. We'll be right back.

Well, hello, Southern Oregon. And welcome back to the real estate show. So glad you [00:03:00] could join us today. I'm Alice Leam, I'm a broker here in beautiful Southern Oregon with John L. Scott real estate. And today we're so lucky to have back one of my favorite favorite people, Jennifer Fleener of Lipperts . She's a designer. She has amazing taste. She knows all things, colors, textures, materials. Welcome back to the show, Jennifer.

Jennifer Fleener: Thank you. It's. It's good to be back here.

Alice Lema: Cool. Cool. So here we are kind of middle 2022. We, we all survived the shutdown and we're all getting ready to fix our houses up again. Can you kind of bring us up to speed? What's been happening this year.

Jennifer Fleener: Yeah, we are making a, a, a big shift, you know, for a long time, grays have kind of ruled the day. We just gray, gray, gray, everything was gray. And you know, I've been, I've been saying for a couple years now we're gonna leave the gray zone and we honestly pick up any design magazine. You look at anything and pretty much grays are [00:04:00] gone now. Before people panic, because they just did their house. Right it, it never just shifts to completely over. It's never gonna be that way. It's gonna be a gradual shifting, but if you start looking, you're gonna see that we are introducing more organic.

We're kind of warming it up. We're going more to topes and we're going a lot of introduction of darker woods for accents and the blonde woods coming in for the floors, which kind of help transition you away from the gray. So they work with gray. But we're also kind of moving away from that direction.

And starting to see, you'll start seeing here in the next few years, the warmer wood tones come back, warmer colors come back. So yeah, it's kind of exciting. We're gonna, we're gonna start seeing a little more color. I think people had to.

Alice Lema: Yeah. You said you predicted that. Yeah, you did. Yeah. you did. So so we're seeing a lot of white cabinets. [00:05:00] Is that gonna shift a little bit out?

Jennifer Fleener: I think, you know, right now, and it's still really big and really hot is the black and white trend. So, you know, you probably in the real estate, you see it, you go down the street and, and it sometimes feels like every other house has been painted like white with the black trim, right?

Yeah. So that's the modern farmhouse kind of that Joanna Gaines influence and that's still black and white is still going to be a very big trend for the next few years. But it's a very definitive color scheme, so it's, it can be somewhat challenging to live with. So what you'll see is you're, they're gonna start introducing some softer pastels to kind of to kind of soften that, that landscape or that, that, you know, aesthetic.

So you like right now, you see a lot of like the corals and the blushes coming in. You'll start to see lavender. Lavender's gonna be a big color in the next couple years. So you'll start to see [00:06:00] those softer colors kind of come in. They'll still work with the black and white, so they don't detract from it like a, like a bright, hot red would or a, a bright yellow or, or something like that.

But they just kind of soften that interior a little bit. So you'll start seeing some,

Alice Lema: The black and white is pretty, like you said, definitive.

Jennifer Fleener: And actually a little bit limiting, right? So but the white cabinets are still gonna be big. We're we're gonna start moving away from shaker cabinets to more of the plain face or traditional.

Alice Lema: So really? Yeah. Oh my gosh.

Jennifer Fleener: So the, you know, the more flat surfaced cabinets will, will start coming back in. But yeah, we'll be moving a little bit away from the shaker.

Alice Lema: Wow. So that's that's a game changer, cuz that's really what everybody's used to seeing. Right.

Jennifer Fleener: But that's, and that's, you know, that's why we, that's why people, they get used to it and they start to go I want something different. I want, [00:07:00] I want the next thing. Right? People always think it it's, you know, marketers that change things up. But honestly, if we get tired of seeing the same thing over and over, we wanna see something different and something new and go, Ooh, that's really cool. So but yeah.

Yeah. So start, and like I said, it won't happen overnight, but start watching for the shaker cabinets to kind of go away and we'll go more towards the flat face cabinets.

Alice Lema: So okay. So is that's, that's a, a cleaner, would you say more contemporary level?

Jennifer Fleener: A little bit more contemporary? Yeah. Yeah. So, and like I said, they'll balance that out, that contemporary feel, they're gonna balance it with like I said, really right now, The there you've got two big movements. I think you've got the black and white movement. And then you've got the really organic where it's, like I said. It's, it's still kind of the white or creamy walls, but they're using, you know, the live edge mantle and they're introducing less refined woods. [00:08:00] So you're, we're not seeing the rustic woods on the floor. We're kind of going more to the wire brushed woods on the floor, but we're seeing, you know, a more natural wood. It's not super polished. It's not super not super glossy. It's just kind of a more matte, natural finish. It's not super rustic either. It doesn't look like you just pulled it out of the forest and hung it on the wall. Right. So, but yeah, that's what, so, so we'll see a lot of that too.

Alice Lema: Well, I think that would appeal to more people anyway, because if you go too rustic, then it's like you said, it's kind of limiting.

Jennifer Fleener: Yeah. And the maintenance, I mean, it just, even from a practical standpoint, if you have something that's super rustic you know, the, the maintenance on it, it's just not realistic. It's gonna collect spiderwebs and they're not gonna be good.

Alice Lema: It's true. You don't think of that, but it's true. How funny? Oh my gosh. Well, I wanna loop back around when you were talking about the [00:09:00] pastels and the rose. Because I just saw that for the first time, like two weeks ago and it caught me by surprise. Can you speak a little bit about where people are applying these softer colors? Like what part of their house, what part, what materials they're using that for.

Jennifer Fleener: Sure. I think that's gonna come more partly in sometimes in furnishings, if somebody's gonna, it's not gonna be, it's not gonna be in the floor covering, it's not gonna even be in the tile. Really. It's gonna be more in the furnishings, like your sofa, maybe an accent chair. And honestly, a lot of it's on the wall. It's just a soft, pretty tone. It's not like you, you don't walk into the room and go, oh, this is pink, right. It's just that kinda blush. It's kind of between it's that, that soft coral. And it's actually a really comfortable color to live with.

So kind of, again, it's soften, you know, grays, can be beautiful, but they can feel really industrial and it just kind of, it softens that for us a little bit. [00:10:00] So it gives it a little bit more of a welcoming environment. Interesting.

Alice Lema: So, so are you saying that someone might have that kind of very soft blush, but when you walk into the room, you're not instantly aware. That's got it. Yeah. Yeah. Wow. What an interesting trend.

Jennifer Fleener: And then, you know, if they bring in accents, they can use a deeper color of that, but yeah, it's, it's, it's it's a nice touch. And the lavenders a lot of times in bedrooms, they'll use the lavenders and bedrooms and bathrooms. If somebody has a, a space in their home, that's more meditative, lavenders and purples have always been a really good color for that.

Alice Lema: So it's oh, really? Very calm. And zen. Yeah. Huh. So would they put that on their walls?

Jennifer Fleener: Absolutely. And if you think gray, gray is really funny, cuz gray is under, I tell people all the time that gray is more influenced by its undertone than any other color. I mean, you can get a gray and put another gray next to it. And all of a sudden it [00:11:00] looks. Blue, right. Or all of a sudden it looks green or it looks purple. So, so again, the lavenders and the, and the peaches, they kind of help people move from the gray zone from being total gray and into that, and kind of soften it. So it's just a good way for us to, to bridge. And yet it still allows you to start introducing the warmer tones that we're moving to.

We're gonna move towards yellows are coming back. The, the warm yellows are coming back. So you'll see those in the next few years, so.

Alice Lema: Wow. That's just such a big difference. So so what if somebody has the gray and white or the black and white where do they start initially slowly bringing their home into this warmer decor into warmer tones.

Jennifer Fleener: Yeah. So I think they kind of have to look at what their budget is and what the, the, the worst thing, I think they the worst thing I think they can do, you know, we've been looking at houses in Idaho. And I see so many times that somebody was told, oh, because the white and black trend or the [00:12:00] gray trend, just, you know, paint your cabinets and paint your walls, white and gray.

But then they have this brown and, and gold countertop. And it's like, no, the more you ignore a color, the more it jumps out at you, so that's the first thing that somebody sees. So, so I would say if they wanna start kind of moving away from the grays You know, doing your flooring and that kind of stuff is expensive.

So if it's something you've recently done, I would start looking at my wall colors and seeing what colors go with that and, and kind of warming up the walls. You can, you, your depth of colors have to be separated, but you absolutely can mix warmer colors in with the grays and still have it feel very comfortable. It's just getting the right warm color with that gray.

Alice Lema: See, and you are a master of that. Jennifer, you are so good at finding just the right shade of flooring, paint, counter, you know, whatever, whatever you're needing to kind of tie it all [00:13:00] together. You really are. I think of you as the fixer.

Jennifer Fleener: I mean, I try to be a good problem solver yeah.

Alice Lema: So gosh, I don't know where to start if, if we're going to softer, warmer. And people are putting blush on the wall. I mean, I'm thrilled. I love that color, but I just didn't think anybody else would.

Jennifer Fleener: You know, it's funny cuz way back in the day when mauves and blues were all the rage.

Oh, that the eighties remember, oh, eighties, early nineties. And I had, I did an office and I had the the walls done in mauve and you know, the funny thing is, is I had more men walk into that office and love that color. Really we think of it as a feminine color, but it really is just a nice calming. It's a, it's a very soothing, comfortable color.

Alice Lema: So yeah. Yeah. Well, and if it's, if it's [00:14:00] light enough, it almost looks like a white or a cream, quite frankly. Exactly. Yeah. Which is not a bad thing. So and I, I have seen some homes done with the warmer kind of mid browns, tans. Yeah. Sand on the floors and then white and grained. It actually looked beautiful.

Jennifer Fleener: Right. Yeah. It it's a, it's a nice color combination. And like I said, it just brings a little, I think it brings a little earthiness to the gray so that, I mean, gray itself can be a really nice natural, but it just brings a little earthiness to it. So it, it just doesn't feel quite as cold. You know, when we're in winter days when it's cold and dreary outside and your environment inside is the same. A lot of times we just need to kind of cozy it up a little bit. So, so introducing those colors helps cozy that up.

Alice Lema: Wow. Well, this will be really fun to keep talking about because the homes have just been on a track, you know, with these [00:15:00] cool undertones. So yeah, so we're talking to Jennifer Fleener of Lipperts. She's. The designer there and we're talking about the color changes, the pallet changes. We're gonna have to dive into what, what that does to your countertops and materials aren't we . Yep, absolutely. So Jennifer Fleener with Lipperts we're gonna be back in a couple minutes after a quick word from our sponsors were brought to you by John Scott, Ashland and Medford, Guy Giles, Churchill Mortgage, and the Rogue Valley Association Realtors. Will be right.

Well, Hey everybody. We're back here with the real estate show. Athema broker general Scott here in Southern Oregon. Speaking with Jennifer Fleener of Lipperts. She's the design person there, and she's bringing us up to speed on some pretty heavy duty changes coming down the pike with home decor, materials and color palettes. Jennifer, thank you again so much for coming back.

Jennifer Fleener: Yeah, absolutely. It's my [00:16:00] pleasure.

Alice Lema: So in the last segment you were dropping the bomb that the grays and whites, the black and whites were kind of inching their way out and making room for some, some warmer undertones.

Jennifer Fleener: Yeah. And keep in mind. I said the black and whites are gonna stay around for a few years.

So that trend is still going pretty strong, but the grays are starting to definitely starting to wane and we're introducing some pastels. And actually they're even gonna introduce a couple other colors like green green is like, remember the kind of forest Emerald green, that color is gonna be coming back into you.

So just. Yeah. We're we're, you know, those of us that are old enough, we're gonna start seeing some things that we've seen before. Just like

Alice Lema: So before the break I was commenting about materials for counters. Well, I was talking about counters, but what I was meaning was materials. So what what's gonna be happening with that? [00:17:00]

Jennifer Fleener: Well, you know, countertops are natural stones, so you'll still have the you'll still again, you'll have some grays and whites, but you'll start seeing again, we're, we're just gonna start heading towards the warmer colors there.

So right now, when you go to the when you go to any store to pick out your granite, you probably see 80% of the gray and white, but I think they'll start looking to, you know, you'll start seeing a difference in what's available to you and, and what you can get. And so absolutely we'll still, granite's still gonna, you know, granite and quartz are still gonna be the top dogs.

And so it it's just, those are, are very earthy, organic colors too. So I've seen, I was just at the one granite store and a lot more browns and blacks and a little bit darker and heavier. But there's also a lot of the light ones, but that's, again, the, the natural stones just really lend themselves. They, they are so [00:18:00] they're so adaptable. And what people really need to understand about color is your eye. Really, it wants things to get along. So we want to see harmonious color. Right. And so a lot of times you can take a gray that has a lot of blue and you can put blue with it. And all of a sudden that gray looks blue or you can take an, a gray and put a green next to it.

And the gray really is kind of a green. So. That's the nice thing about gray is it is adaptable to those other colors. And so as we start to see those other colors introduced, I think the countertops they'll, they'll change a little bit. They're, they're what, they're what God gave us from the earth. So you we'll just see what we're putting around it, be a little different.

So there we go. You know, and, and the flooring we definitely went from, we're moving from darker colored floorings to the blonde woods on the floor. You know, lightening that part of it up. So you you'll see a lot more blonde woods. And then [00:19:00] again, that kind of going to the medium brown. So it'll go away from the, the really dark black floors or you know, the really red we're not gonna see at least anytime seen a resurgence of the real red floors or anything like that.

Alice Lema: Well, those are hard to take care of. Anyway, in my opinion, if you have too much red in your floor I don't know, is it just me or is it like fading is fading a problem?

Jennifer Fleener: It can be usually usually your cherries or your red's darkened down. So they usually get a little darker, but they can, you know, depending on how much light they get on 'em they can fade but you're right. They just show more, they show more debris, they show more dust and dirt and, and I think as people spent more time at home, they don't wanna be slaves to their homes.

They want their homes to work for them. And they're asking more of their homes now than they were before all of the COVID stuff. So they definitely want lower maintenance and, and blond [00:20:00] floors are typically just a lower maintenance product. You're not gonna see as much of the dust bunnies.

Alice Lema: And cause that's what color dust bunnies are. Right. So I wanted to just could you explain the difference between the quartz counters and granite for the listeners that aren't quite sure you know, what the material difference is?

Jennifer Fleener: Yeah. So you, you really have three options for countertops. You have your quartz, which is a manmade product. So they take part of the quartz stone and they grind it up and they mix it with the resin. So those are usually pretty consistent. If you see a small piece, you're not gonna usually be surprised by the bigger piece. And then you have granite. Granite is actually the stone harvested from the earth. So it, they go and mine, the big slabs out, you know, from, from the hillside.

So your granite and, and honestly what makes the granite super expensive versus one that's less expensive is [00:21:00] how common is the granite. If the granite can be found in China and it can be found in south America and it can be found in Turkey, you're probably not gonna pay a whole lot of money for it. But if this particular granite is only found in this place, this one place in the world, you're gonna pay for that exclusivity. Right.

But then from granite you have quartzite and quartzite is a tougher material. So quartz and quartzite are two different things. Uhhuh quartzite is a tougher material. It's still is natural stone, but it's harvested from a little deeper in the, in the earth. It, I think it has just a beautiful It just has a, a depth to it that you don't get with traditional granite, but it costs more from a, from a standpoint of the slab itself. And also from a fabrication standpoint, it's a harder product to it's it's harder. So it takes more time to [00:22:00] fabricate. And so it costs a little more money, but it's definitely for somebody that's had quartzite and they love it. It's definitely a beautiful product.

Alice Lema: And, and at what colors does it come.

Jennifer Fleener: It all, all kinds of colors. You can get it in rust and black. You can get it like Pearl is kind of a soft topey color. It can come in a soft sagey green color. So again, lots of different, yeah, lots of different colors.

Alice Lema: So. Well, and I remember one time you were suggesting that if somebody was redoing their whole room or their whole house, that that correct me if I, if I got it wrong, but start with the floor color first.

Jennifer Fleener: I would start with the granite first start with the granite first.

Alice Lema: So I remembered it wrong. I'm sorry. Yeah. Okay. So let's talk about if you're gonna redo your thing, the order to do it in.

Jennifer Fleener: So if you're gonna redo something you wanna start with, I, I say start from what is probably your most limiting [00:23:00] product. So honestly that makes sense, granite. There's very. There there's fewer options in that probably than any other product that you're gonna look at. Plus it's kind of the center of the home, right? The kitchen's kind of the center of the home and, and it, so you don't wanna pick out your flooring and then pick out your wall color and pick out your tile and then go, Ooh. Now I have to match the granite. Cause you might back itself up against a wall where if you start with the granite, you have a lot more options for flooring and for tile and that kind of stuff.

Plus, if you, from a design standpoint, if you pick a granite and it's got a lot of movement, it's got a lot of waves or it's got some, you know, a lot going on. We don't want to pick a really busy floor. Because then that's just gonna cause visual confusion and it's gonna feel messy and busy no matter what. So if we pick a granite that has a lot of movement to it, then we wanna make sure that we [00:24:00] pick a tile or a wood floor. It has a little bit less movement to it. So it just, yeah. So I say, start with your granite and then we filled out from there.

Alice Lema: Oh, I'm so glad I asked you that question I remembered it wrong. Completely wrong. Yeah. So, well, I'm kind of happy to hear about these warmer trends. I love the, the whites and the grays and the, the black and whites, but it is a little bit cold. And here in Southern Oregon, during the winter, you know, It's just nice to see a little bit of warmth creeping back into people's designs.

Jennifer Fleener: And I think it's also a little bit more limiting again. It's just, when you have the warmer colors, it's just, it's easier to introduce, you know, more color to it. So it's not such a definitive color scheme and, and that just, you know, I'm a little bit eclectic myself. So my personal style, I like a little bit of color in there.

Alice Lema: mm-hmm oh, I bet. I bet. So So, if you're starting [00:25:00] your, your color choices and you start with your counters what, what do you suggest next?

Jennifer Fleener: So next we need, but, and again, even before the flooring, I'm gonna say, figure out what you wanna do per cabinetry. Cuz if you wanna do wood cabinetry and you wanna do a stain grade, then again, we need to make sure that the wood flooring and the stain grade are so, so I guess they kind of almost have to be hand in hand. But the, your cabinetry is gonna be a big part of that equation.

So we don't wanna pick out a topey wood and then go for the cabinets and then go a super blonde red, yellowy wood for the floor. Cuz they're just not gonna look good together. So so that's when we can start spreading out to the rest of the house and start doing so I would say your cabinets and then your wood floors. After that, or if, if the, you know, if you have a good cabinet guy, you can start with your floors and have them adjust the cabinet colors. Those two [00:26:00] things kind of have to be done hand in hand.

Alice Lema: Mm gotcha. So when do you recommend that people paint their cabinets versus real wood?

Jennifer Fleener: If they have a lot of wood going on in the house, let's say they, they have a log cabin or they have a, they put a ceiling in the, they love that wood ceiling and they have a tongue and groove ceiling. I'm going to, and they do a wood floor. When you get wood on top of wood on top of wood, it's, it's a little too much of one note, right? So at that point in time, I would say absolutely do painted cabinets.

Other than that, it really just comes down to what, what appeals to you? Do you, do you love the grain of the wood or do you love the, the look of a painted cabinet. Painted cabinets are gonna be more maintenance than stained cabinet. You know that that plays into the factor too, but honestly, outside of having a lot of wood also around it, it just comes down to personal choice.

Alice Lema: Mm-hmm [00:27:00] mm-hmm . Yeah. And I don't think people realize how much work it is to keep up painted cabinets. right.

Jennifer Fleener: Yeah. It it's cuz the paint can flake and peel and chip and it's, you know, you're, you're gonna drip water on 'em and it just, it just does. So and stain penetrates the grain. So you just don't have that issue as much.

Alice Lema: Mm-hmm mm-hmm so that's, that's great. Great tips. And also we could just call you and have you do it all, because then it's gonna look good. It's gonna last, it's not gonna be a problem. So so earlier you had mentioned that the cabinet door styles were changing to something sleeker. Do you, is that because we're just going to a more urban look in general.

Jennifer Fleener: I, I think it's just, it's different. And I think, again, it comes down to maintenance. I think it comes down to, you know, it's easier. I think as people have been at home and they realize, okay, I need to maintain this. You know, it's, [00:28:00] it's easier. So you're saying they don't wanna dust their cabinets anymore. I'm saying when their kids spill something and they don't wanna have to clean it out and they can just wipe it down.

Alice Lema: Yeah. Yep. You have a smooth face. It's it's brilliant on many levels. So we're talking with Jennifer Fleener the designer at Lipperts carpet floors. You guys have everything.

Jennifer Fleener: We do we do. Yeah, we do countertops tile.

Alice Lema: So, well, we've got a quick break coming up. So don't touch that dial. We'll be right back with more good advice from Jennifer Fleener.

Well, welcome back to the real estate show folks, Alice Lema here, broker John L. Scott, and having a great great informative conversation with Jennifer Fleener of Liperts here locally in Medford. And during the break, we were starting to talk a little bit about flooring and some of the ugly stuff you like to bring to the show. So let's talk about the uglies Jennifer . Okay. Talk your pet peeves.

Jennifer Fleener: One of my pet peeves, cuz I feel [00:29:00] it's one of the fastest growing product categories. I feel it's being way oversold and over promised is vinyl plank flooring.

Okay. So you see it on, you see it all day long on HGTV on DIY networks. But the reality of it is you need to be careful, cuz they'll tell you the, the product itself is a hundred percent waterproof. That is in fact very, very true, but how they tell you that you get a waterproof floor is to add a bead of caulking around the perimeter or a tube of foam around the perimeter. But here's the reality vinyl expands and contracts just the same as a wood floor does.

Alice Lema: I did not know that.

Jennifer Fleener: Yep. It still grows. Remember your old sheet vinyl, how it would curl back, like at the seam or at the wall? Yeah, it would curl back because the vinyl was growing and shrinking and the paper that was attached to it wasn't, so eventually that vinyl would curl that paper back.

So vinyl still expands and contract. And so [00:30:00] what happens is that, that product that you're putting around the perimeter of the room is gonna fail. When your dishwasher springs a leak or your refrigerator springs, a leak that water's finding its way to their subfloor. Which is, guess what, wood. Yeah. So and the one thing that they, don't, the one thing that they love to tell you, and that they don't, that they leave out is they'll say, well, it's got a 20 milemeter wear.

Well, a 20 mm layer of what, cuz 20 mils of tissue paper is still tissue paper.

Alice Lema: So I love talking to you. That's great.

Jennifer Fleener: so what they do is it's it's got a 20 mm wear layer of urethane. Urethane isn't tough as polyurethane. So your laminates, which are water resistant, typically have a polyurethane wear layer on 'em.

So they're gonna be much more scratch resistant than your vinyl plank. And they're. They're gonna hold up just fine. And you're gonna pay less money for your laminate. Because right now, like I said, [00:31:00] vinyl it's, most of it is made in China overseas. Oh. So they just don't even have the factories or the outlets here to produce it.

And the raw materials have gone up over 30% in the last six months. Your vinyl plank is going higher and higher and higher. And you know, a lot of times when, when people come in here to shop, I'll take a key to a little section of vinyl plank and show them that I can scratch that. And I'll take that same key to the laminate and it won't scratch.

 If you're in a situation where you say, okay, I live next to the river or I live on the lake and I have dogs come in and out and I absolutely need waterproof, then yes be thinking of waterproof. But if you don't absolutely need waterproof floors and you think it's gonna save you from a, a leaking refrigerator or a leaking dishwasher, it's just not gonna do that for you and keep an open mind to other [00:32:00] possibilities.

Cuz I think you probably will be able to find something. I mean, some of those vinyl plank floors are as much as hardwood floors now.

Alice Lema: Yeah, they are. They are. Yeah. And it's hard to know why. Yeah, they would say, well, what am I getting for that much extra money? They don't really have an explanation. Yeah.

Jennifer Fleener: Yeah. Yeah. And it's, again, it's just, it's, it's a challenge because like I said, and I have a lot of people walk into the store and go, I, I need the vinyl plank floor. And when I sit down and say, okay, well, let's talk about why you think you need the vinyl plank floor. Well, because the guy down the street told me, that's what I need.

And it's like, but you know, so, you know, if you have three big dogs or even two big dogs. And they're active in your household that may not be the right choice for you. So a in that case, a laminate's gonna serve you better. You know, wood is still wood, it's still gonna dent and scratch, but you know, yeah.

Just make sure you look into it. And there's a lot of other beautiful options out there, and [00:33:00] I'm glad to see that laminate is kind of coming back with some more options and some more choices. And I think it's a really good way to go.

Alice Lema: So, well, that is great advice. And I think people just forget there are these other products and they might serve your needs better. So speaking of supply, you know, what's how, how are you guys doing with the supply chain?

Jennifer Fleener: So again, the vinyl, the vinyl plank and vinyl tile, we have experienced a lot of back orders on. Our carpet, because all carpet is made in the United States for the most part you know, it's, it all comes from Georgia. So carpet, hasn't been a huge issue for us as far as that.

Alice Lema: Oh, that's good.

Jennifer Fleener: So, yeah, so we've been, we still run into a few back orders, but our biggest challenge has been wood products and the vinyl plank and the vinyl tile. Those have been our, our hotspots for us for as far as supply.

Alice Lema: Okay. So what about tile for flooring back splashes, things like that?

Jennifer Fleener: We [00:34:00] had, we had a little bit of an issue, but that was more early on with COVID because some, a lot of the tiles come from Italy. So, you know, for a while, Italy was shut down. But since then we really haven't had any problems. And especially if we get some, you know, American made products, we, we just haven't had seen. Now, now with that being said, You know, we've had a lot of freight surcharges come into play. So you, we have that issue when you're, especially when you start talking heavier products, like the woods and the tile.

Alice Lema: Are, are you saying that the, the delivery people are charging more?

Jennifer Fleener: Yeah, because the cost of fuel, so we are getting, yeah. So it it's really impacted the cost of the, of those goods.

Alice Lema: Wow. So we went through a shortage partway through the shutdown. Is that easing up at all with these kind of materials?

Jennifer Fleener: It is, it is we're and even labor shortages. We're we are starting to see it's slowing [00:35:00] down just a little bit that way. We, we still have a lot of business going on, but, but it's kind of you know, come down to a medium roar. There for a while, you know, two, three months to get an installer. But now things are, are kind of more on an even keel.

Alice Lema: Uhhuh. So, so about what do you have an idea of what the average wait time is for an installer ?

Jennifer Fleener: Probably about three to four weeks.

Alice Lema: Well, that's kind, it kind of was that anyway before it wasn't it like before COVID.

Jennifer Fleener: Three weeks. Yeah. Was that two to three weeks? Yeah. Cause it takes a couple weeks to get the product here. And then about, you know, and then we usually get them scheduled about a week after that. So yeah. So kinda back on an even keel, almost back to 2019

Alice Lema: Wow. Wow. So labor shortage fire work, is the fire work kind of wrapping up from the Almeda fire. Do you think people are kinda done building?

Jennifer Fleener: Yeah, I think, I, I think, [00:36:00] you know, we haven't seen a lot going on there, so we we've had, we still have a couple people that that we've dealt with that have lost their homes. But I think most of that's kind of been wrapping up. I mean, there's, they're building the the mobile home parks and stuff are still re in the process of rebuilding. So, but that doesn't impact us quite as much.

Alice Lema: Mm-hmm so mm-hmm . Wow. Well, it's just a blessing that you guys are here. Jennifer Fleener of Lipperts. How do people reach you if they wanna quick chat or some good advice?

Jennifer Fleener: They can call me at my direct line. It's 541-955-6474 or you can email me at Jennifer at Lipperts.com

Alice Lema: And she's a wealth of knowledge. She's lots of fun and everything she does looks beautiful. You should see some of the houses she's designed.

Thank you, Jennifer. We so appreciate you being on the show again. thank you. This show's gonna be rebroadcast tomorrow, Sunday at six o'clock. Thank you, [00:37:00] Jennifer. Everybody have a beautiful Southern Oregon weekend. Bye now.