The customer(s) appearing on home sales or renovation shows has been a favorite target topic of mine since I began. Having written extensively, well, twice actually, about some of the folks “Hunters” television manages to scrape up, I’m branching out. Let me say at the outset that I’m a huge fan of the work that Drew and Jonathan do. They’re brilliant, inspired, remarkably friendly and eternally patient. The homes they create are stunning. I’m not convinced some of their clients are worthy of them.
Having said that, I enjoy the opening segment, when Drew shows the loving couple the “teaser” house. That’s the one about four times what they can spend on a house, but “it’s exactly what this couple had in mind”. Their looks, in a captivating emotional range from surprise to utter despair when he tells them the actual asking price, is a thing of beauty.
Now let me comment if I may on the delightful personalities of folks that make it onto the show. First, there are the ones that haven’t a clue. Totally, totally, no clue whatsoever. They can’t picture anything. They’re completely devoid of vision. They walk into a house and start critiquing, complaining really, about the wall colors, the floors, the bathrooms, kitchen cabinets and countertops, the layout. If there are arches, they don’t like them. If there aren’t, there should be. The bathroom tile is “dated”. Of course it is. Nothing’s been done to it since the Eisenhower Administration. That’s the whole point of the show. Did they really think Jonathan was going to leave them with kitchen cabinet doors hanging off their hinges and pink subway tile because he suddenly going for vintage? One wife on a show this morning frankly stated, “ I just can’t imagine . . “ By all that holy, she should have stopped right there. She’s right – she can’t imagine – anything. She couldn’t figure out where the island would go in the kitchen. Hasn’t she seen the show before? Doesn’t she know that walls will be gone and wide swaths of openness and sunshine will appear? That’s why you have a renovation budget that’s well north of a mansion in the midwest. When it’s done, it will look NOTHING like the initial, pre-purchase state, so don’t even bother talking. Just walk quietly through with your mouths closed. The husband was no better. Mr. Fussy was talking in each house they visited about how dirty they were. Of course they were. It’s all going to be demolished as part of the show. Really? That’s your problem? Perhaps a cleaning crew could scrub everything down before it all gets torn out to the studs. Again, not fully grasping the concept. Drew had shown this couple every possible property, including garages and tree houses, for sale in their “preferred neighborhood”. The wife expressed disappointment that “there was nothing else.” She actually said, “I just wish there was something else we could look at.” This is the moment when I’d like to be standing behind Drew, so I could casually, unobtrusively, saunter up and slap her. Maybe these two could pick out a house they liked and have several bar bouncers pay the owners a visit with a deal they couldn’t resist.
Another type that seems to crop up with amazing regularity are the “extreme helpers”. These are the ones that veto almost every design suggestion that Jonathan has because, as amateurs, they just know so much better. They’ve picked out their own tiles, their own cabinets, countertops, bathroom fixtures, furniture. About the only thing they didn’t pick out was the new furnace. They would have, except that replacing it came as a surprise. One such couple drove Jonathan nuts as, each day, another box of purchases would arrive. Jonathan stood on at the front door asking, “what did you buy now?” The boxes eventually filled the garage. Jonathan, always the gentleman, registered his version of irritation by jokingly telling them there was nothing left for him to select. Clearly they haven’t watched the show enough to recognize Jonathan’s look of stunned disbelief. I would have tied them both up and thrown them into a storage locker for the remaining three weeks of the renovation. This couple – the wife in particular, fancied herself an expert, so the house had to have her design touches. Do these folks ever watch the show and know that the Scott brothers do for a living?
One couple, in a repeat from some time ago, was relocating from Wisconsin to Tennessee. They’d built their “dream house” in Wisconsin – that seems to be an oxymoron. By definition, a “dream house” in Wisconsin is a remote possibility at best. It’s like building a beach house in the Yukon. I don’t think so, but again I digress. She was moving her elderly father with them, and was thus emotionally fragile. I call her “Weepy”, because everything good reminded her of Wisconsin, and anything else was left behind in their dream house. She spent fully two thirds of the show wiping away tears, and completely dissolved into a blubbering mess at the end when her husband and sons planned a surprise back porch for her.
Every so often there are people that “change their minds” well into the project. They’ve “found” some flooring, wallcovering, fireplace, or countertops that they prefer after the original selections have been made and the materials are on their way. They’re having second thoughts about the pantry, or a load-bearing wall is in the way. There is not enough “sight line” to the kids’ play area. Truth be told, those kids should be sent to boarding school anyway. Or, they’re not totally trusting the wallpaper Jonathan’s picked for the accent wall or the tile for the fireplace surround, so they come up with something else. Once again, I’m thinking that were I Jonathan, they’d get a trowel of wet plaster across the face. He, however, dutifully incorporates their “aesthetic” into the plan and moves on. Just once, I’d like to hear him screaming hysterically at a couple that they’ve ruined HIS plan, it’s HIS television show, and their additions clash with everything he’s worked to achieve. Then, he could angrily storm out and leave them to finish the house by themselves. In the closing segment, we see half-done work, doors and windows at odd angles, the master bath still has pink subway tile, and the roof leaks. The couple is throwing angry recriminations at each other as Drew comes back to tell them that the house is now worth about a hundred fifty grand less than they paid for it and that he’s sent their picture to every contractor within a two-hundred mile radius. Then we’ll see how fast that woman’s chirpy, annoying voice can be heard on the phone sending back a garage load of hardwood flooring. Ordinarily I’m not a violent person, but watching some of these folks brings out the ugliness that lies in us all. Wait a minute – there’s a whole new concept. Renovation From Hell, where the Property Brothers or the Flipper Floppers meet the Egomaniac Home Buyers, possibly a selected subset of Marriage Bootcamp or Bridezilla candidates. Home Renovation meets the Swamp People. Yep, I’m sensing winners here. I’m thinking, . . . . . Oh God! Somebody stop me.
I'm Thinking...No! 