If the government was open for business this week, the Census Bureau would have released the latest data on orders of durable goods Monday — that includes some important big-ticket stuff consumers buy, like washers, dryers and refrigerators. Alas, Monday marks day 27 of the government shutdown.

In lieu of that public data, you can bet there’ll be more attention on one Michigan-based manufacturer when it reports its quarterly earnings: Whirlpool.

McKenzie Dahl is the sales manager at Kitchen Kings, a retailer of major home appliances north of Dallas. She said her hottest items right now are also among her priciest.

“More of our high-end appliances are going right now. So Sub-Zero, Wolf, Cove, Thermador, those brands are like hotcakes,” she said.

The less expensive Whirlpools and Fridigaires aren’t moving as much. Dahl has a working theory why: a sluggish housing market.

“I see a lot of people doing remodels instead of buying new,” she said. “So they’ve got money in their pockets and they’re getting the good stuff.”

Home sales are down from their pandemic-era highs in Dallas and nationally. And the appliance market is married to the housing market: When someone buys a home, they spend about $2,700 on new appliances, according to research by the National Association of Homebuilders.

When someone buys a newly constructed home, they spend even more, said NAHB chief economist Robert Dietz.

“In a year where you've got single family housing construction down, that's going to be downward pressure for appliance makers and retailers,” he said.

The sluggish housing market is the big reason Whirlpool’s Q2 net sales dropped this year compared to last. (In the third quarter, net sales ticked up 1%.)

You’d think tariffs would actually help. Eighty percent of Whirlpool’s manufacturing is based in the U.S., while leading competitors, like Samsung and LG, make lots of their products in Asia.

Rafe Jadrosich at Bank of America said those tariffs really haven’t changed much. “So far, we've not seen major market share shifts,” he said.

Because tariffs haven’t quite forced those giant multinational corporations with other lines of business to raise prices — at least not yet.