i did meet a few of the these reality designer show stars .....they were real cool in real life as opposed to the horse shite they have to portray on TV i guess......i met andrew dan jumbo .....and a guy called doug from changing rooms .........or whatever they called it ......where they 24 hours........ or some shit ........we all know the average guy could never do it in that amount of time ......i loved these shows very interesting but you always know something had to be wrong sometime ......however i did read many years back that they had lawsuits .....things done shoddy and taped up and stuff .........well that is showbusiness for ya folks!.............well here are some more tales of woe for these shows ..........enjoy or not as i always say ......
People On Home Makeover Shows Revealed What Happened After The Cameras Turned Off, And Yikes...
Lauren Garafano
14 min read
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I recently came across this Reddit thread asking, "People who’ve been on home renovation or remake shows, how’s the house holding up?" and was floored by some of these responses. Here's what people said:
Some responses are also from this thread because they're just too good not to share.
1. "The plumbing and remodeling company I work for did plumbing for an HGTV show about 10 years ago. We did the hookups for the new laundry room. The homeowners picked some fancy Moroccan tile for the floors at an upscale NYC boutique, and the show's host decided it would look better without grout... which went about as well as you’d expect. Filming wrapped, and we were called back out a few weeks later to replace the fancy tile that immediately chipped and became dangerous with some boring tile."
The Good Brigade / Getty Images
2. "My family was on a home renovation show when I was a kid, in the late '90s, early 2000s. It was one of those shows where they decorated three rooms in the house, and mine was one of them. It looked so pretty. They decorated it to look like a fairy woodland with huge tree murals on the walls and a night sky of stars hanging from the ceiling. But it held up really badly. All the murals on the wall peeled off, and it looked bad pretty quickly. I had fun shooting the show, though, and it was a cool story to tell my friends at school."
3. "Friends were on a show a few years ago. It was a super-intense three weeks of filming, and the redesign looked great on camera. In reality, it was literally things stuck together with staples and tape. After the show, my friend took two weeks off work to rebuild everything properly."
Kathrin Ziegler / Getty Images
Related: People Are Calling Out The Current Home Design Trends That Are Slowly Becoming "Outdated"
4. "We were on a backyard makeover show. It was done super cheaply and fast. They decorated it super nicely for the 'reveal,' and then they took away all the decorations that actually made it look good. They added a little pond in the backyard that was hooked up with an extension cord that would trip a breaker every time it rained. But the best part was that two weeks after the show, our backyard was very soggy and smelled like shit. It turns out they dug up our sewer line when they put in the pond, and sewage was going everywhere."
5. "A coworker got her house on one of those designer competition shows, and she pulled the short straw on the designers. Instead of getting a free makeover, she got about $20,000 worth of damage to the house."
MoMo Productions / Getty Images
6. "My sister’s master bedroom got a makeover on a 'surprise your spouse' show. The designer was going for an 'Arabian Nights' romantic vibe, but it ended up pretty weird-looking, with all the closets hidden behind yards of draped fabric. They took it all down and painted the room a neutral color within months. The show also took the ceiling fan out and replaced it with a giant tree branch wired up with twinkling lights. Not too long afterward, half the lights went out, and it was too hot in the room without the fan, so that got put back on as well. On the bright side, it didn’t cost them anything and was a fun experience, and they got a couple of new furniture pieces out of it, but in the end, they didn’t keep any of it the same."
7. "Some family friends were on one of those shows. Their son was about six years old and really into trains, so he got an insanely train-themed room, complete with a ride-on train that chugged slowly on a track around the room. It was great at first, but he outgrew it really quickly and was embarrassed by his train room within a few years. The paint on the outside of the house started chipping off within weeks, and the house looked HORRIBLE, with big chunks of peeled-off paint."
Maskot / Getty Images/Maskot
8. "Some friends were on a backyard renovation show...they put SO many plants in. Given that they were full-time workers with families, the upkeep was simply not possible. It looked terrible within the year."
9. "I'm a painter and know two different couples who were on Love It or List It. The painted rooms looked good enough for the camera, but sh*t in person. They had to repaint all renovated areas."
Israel Sebastian / Getty Images
Related: "What F*cking Man Designed This?!": 33 "Nightmare" Home Design Choices That Homeowners Warn Against
10. "Awesome, life-changing experience. The HGTV host chose the better room to renovate. The ones who actually do the work came back on an offshoot month and did another room. Their wife staged the house like a boss when we sold five years later. Made a lot. Moved to a quiet town and bought land and a much bigger house. Haven’t watched a home renovation show in years, but that experience was fun and helpful."
11. "My friend was on Love It or List It. She said that they did great-quality work at a fraction of what it would have normally cost (the homeowners on this show have to pay for the renovations). She did say that her family were told to be all dramatic and have little arguments about the renovations to add spice to the show."
—ylzz
Natasha Lazaridi / Getty Images
12. "Extreme Makeover came to my town in like 2013–14 and did a demolition and new build of a house for my family friends. Luckily, they had the means to keep the house (property taxes went WAY up). It’s still a really nice house, and a few people I know have even gotten married there. The house held up super well."
13. "I worked for Trading Spaces on TLC in the early 2000s. I’d be VERY surprised if any of the crap they did is still holding up."
Kathrin Ziegler / Getty Images
14. "My cousin was on a show called In A Fix in the early 2000s. They replaced her bedroom door with one of those Japanese-style sliding doors, and the cheap thing jammed so often that they just got rid of it altogether. Oh, and then there was the electrical fire that happened while dad and son were home. Everyone made it out okay, but the house was basically unsalvageable, and they had to move. The place looked really nice while it lasted, though."
15. "The house I’m renting was on that new Flipping Showdown HGTV show. We had no idea until I was casually watching the show. The appliances stopped working after two months due to electrical issues, and the floors are extremely uneven, so we have to pull the furniture away from the walls to prevent it from tipping. There are issues with the HVAC, the water, etc. You can also see where they just didn’t finish things or level things. Cabinets aren’t flush with the floor, countertops don’t fit vanities, they left every nail in the wall, and a garage full of trash! There’s also bad ductwork and mold issues we weren’t told about."
Related: 16 "Most Hated" Modern Home Design Trends People Want To See Disappear In The Next Few Years
Catherine Delahaye / Getty Images
16. "My coworker worked as a producer on one of those shows, and she told me that all the furniture goes back after taping. But they do get to keep all the fixtures, unlike in most reno shows. Also, I know a couple of people who did the show who are STILL trying to finish remodeling the rest of their home (the parts not shown)."
17. "My cousin’s house was on House Hunters Renovation. The house-hunting part was fake (they’d already bought a house), and they came up with a storyline to add drama, but the renovation part was very well done. It looks great, and he’s really happy with it. He also said the designer was really attentive to their personal style and what they wanted done."
Witthaya Prasongsin / Getty Images
18. "When I was 11-12, I lived a few houses down from a house that got on a home renovation show that promised to redo the house in just a week. In reality, they were there for several months, and it was very hard to ignore their massive truck parked on such a narrow street for so long. I walked past it every day on my way to school."
"Anyway, obviously I can't speak for what the interior looked like, but the exterior was painted this vomit-green colour on only two sides of the house, the front and right sides, while the left and back sides were still left with their chipped white paint. They painted a very pretty picture during the episode, and the homeowners gave them fake-happy reactions. Really, they were pissed to be left with a half-finished house, not just on the outside, but the inside as well, because they only redid a few rooms. The owners eventually had the house repainted to a nice blue color outside and fixed a lot of the things that had been messed up on the inside."
19. "I worked for an HGTV show in the 2000s, and although the work they did was actually great, most of it had to be removed because they never got permits from the city or condo boards to actually do any of the work. On our last day of shooting, we had bylaw officers show up to shut us down. We stalled them while we finished our last shots. Also, all that nice decor and furniture they put in? The people get to keep it if they pay for it. New giant TV? Yours for a discounted price. That old-growth wood dining table worth $12,000? We will give it to you for $10,000. We used that table on at least four episodes because no one would buy it."
Jackyenjoyphotography / Getty Images
20. "I had a coworker who told me that years ago she was on Trading Spaces. Her neighbors talked her into it, and she said she hadn't really known about the show. She had little kids, and among other things, they glued HAY to her wall, destroyed her fireplace, put up massive bookshelves without mounting them, and put heavy blinds on the windows. Her kids had allergies and had to stay somewhere else until they could get the house to be a hazard-free environment for them.
21. "My family was on a backyard makeover show back in 2003. They didn't really listen to our requests, but the yard turned out nice. We have six kids in my family, so of course, we wanted a pool, and that didn't happen. Which was fine until we watched episodes later that season, and they gave several other families pools. Also, we were locked in the house for two straight days, and for some reason, we could not use the internet. It was before my siblings and I had cell phones, so we had lots of family bonding time playing games. The camera crew had us do some stupid things together to 'pass the time' where we pretended to dribble a basketball and do other weird things."
The Good Brigade / Getty Images
22. "When I lived back home, a neighbour of ours was on a British home makeover show called 60 Minute Makeover. They must've been there for about three and a half weeks. Our street is kinda small, too, so their huge food tent would get in the way all the time. The woman whose home was being redecorated found out about the 'surprise,' and I remember one of the producers telling her to 'act surprised' when she walked in. Then, two weeks later, she had her son re-paint the whole place, because she hated the colors they chose. I thought they did a great job. Her house looked beautiful once they had finished, but she was one of those women who were never satisfied."
23. "I had a buddy do one of those shows. He would not do it again. They gave him a $10K allowance for doing the show, which sounded great and closed the deal. The problem was that the show selected contractors with little regard for competitive bidding. The contractor was under pressure to get the renovation done in time for taping and cut many corners to get everything done. The house looked great on TV but awful in person. Much of the work was unfinished, and once the show was taped and the contractor was paid, he had no motivation to return and address the problems. My buddy was very disappointed."
"Even with the $10K allowance, he spent far more than he would have if he had managed this himself on a realistic time frame with competitive bids."
Travelism / Getty Images
24. "My family was on Trading Spaces when I was younger. For those not in the know, it was a show where you and another family switched houses, and each redecorated a room with the help of designers. It was great, and we didn't actually have to do anything. A professional crew worked all day on the room while my family was filmed doing other things. It was a lot of fun watching them act like they were the ones making the room. When the filming wasn't happening, there was a lot of downtime. We really were forced to stay in the other family's house, so it got kind of boring sometimes, but overall, the experience was really exciting."
"Being around the crew was a lot of fun and even inspired me to want to work in the TV industry. The room we got turned out great, and we were all very happy with it. Sadly, my family has gone through two moves since being on the show, and with every move we've lost more and more of the original room (due to the logistics of moving some pieces, things breaking, etc.), but there is still a place in the house that has a few things from when we were on."
25. "My aunt and uncle lived in a small town where Extreme Makeover Home Edition came and rebuilt a farmhouse. The problem was that the new house was more than double the size of the old one. After the show left, the family couldn't afford to keep the house because the cost of utilities was so high, so they moved."
Maskot / Getty Images/Maskot
26. "A friend was on House Hunters. They had recently purchased a unique home. Their real estate agent had been contacted by the show and was asked if they had any clients that had recently purchased this type of unique home. The production crew flew in, filmed them being shown their house and two other homes that were on the market. They were asked to make up things they didn't like about their house and the other two."
"At the conclusion of the show, when they are debating which one to buy, it's just a fake conversation. Even down to the coffee they were drinking (they don't drink coffee). After my friends had finished some remodeling and fully moved in, the production crew came back and filmed more scenes, this time with a fake party that required several takes."
27. Lastly, "My stepsister and her husband were on Renovation Raiders. Unlike most HGTV shows, this one is more or less real, and the backstory about them is, too. The house was a foreclosure, so the old kitchen was kind of trashed. They got a nice new kitchen for free. They also couldn't use their new kitchen for a day or two until the crew could come back in the daytime and get 'after' shots, and when the crew started, they threw everything into boxes and put them in the crawlspace, and it took them weeks to unpack and organize everything in their new kitchen. The wall behind the front door had a hole from the doorknob smashing into it, which was 'fixed' by installing a metal plate over it. They patched it properly, but then a worker, in the rush to clean up, threw the door open and smashed it again."
Maskot / Getty Images/Maskot
Responses have been edited for length/clarity.
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