Home Makeover Disaster. Crew Leaves House Unfinished?

We've talked here before about the reality of home makeover shows. 

How too much happens for the good of the television viewing audience and not enough for the people giving up their time, home, and personal secrets. Our Los Angeles friends in the "business" work hard to turnover an entire room makeover in a day or two with young designers, hunky carpenters and 40 production assistants walking through your personal life and with disregard for your stuff.  We've heard rumors that parts of the houses get neglected while others become stashing locales.  All this so the editors can whip together that wonderful "after" shot full of organized design, artfully placed books, and carefully chosen mementos.

Well, we discovered a home makeover headache for one unlucky participant and the Baltimore Sun wrote about it.

"When James Buechler volunteered for the Style Network's Clean House, a show that clears the clutter from your home, he got more - actually, less - than he expected.

He did get new furniture, paint and organization in his Sparrows Point house, which he said he is mostly pleased with. But much of the makeover stopped where the cameras did, leaving parts of walls without color, a hallway half-tiled and a lot of nicks and dents from the 50-person crew."

Buechler, according to the Baltimore Sun, says the crew left with more than nicks and dents. The crew soiled his carpets, and bailed following the shoot, not hauling away trash and storage tubs.  They abandoned plywood in the staging area in his backyard, hid furniture and tossed his old mattress into the garage.  In short, he claims they left the home so topsy-turvy, he could not find his socks and underwear.

We shared this article with three friends who have worked extensively in the reality tv makeover business.  One didn't mind sharing a quote, but didn't want to be named:

"John, these homeowners are turning their keys and their most valuable possessions over to a bunch of strangers who stick you in a hotel. They go through everything and turn your home upside down. It's no wonder this family can't find their underwear."

"Many homeowners on these makeover shows can be a real pain. They get thousands of dollars worth of of free furniture and accessories not to mention all the free labor to pull it together. They can get very greedy and see deep pockets when the producers come knocking. The fact that the Baltimore Sun quoted the garage sale was the largest sale in Clean House history makes me wonder who's issue this really is."

Monica Ricci, a veteran of several MISSION: Organization shows on HGTV shared this with us her thoughts:

"Having worked in tv, you realize very quickly it's not about the homeowner; it's about the tv program and the audience. I can see why this homeowner is unhappy. If my home were left in a shambles, I'd be upset too. If the production company has the budget to employ a 50-person crew during taping, they should have the integrity and the money to leave the property in decent shape when the episode is finished."

What do you think?

Maryland Homeowner Unhappy With Clean House - Baltimore Sun, by Meredith Cohn

Images courtesy Baltimore Sun and Barbara Haddock Taylor and Chiaki Kawajiri

Related Posts:

Clean House Comes Clean About Reality Television

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Comments

[Juliette R.]

Abercrombie and Fitch did a 3 day photo shoot in a house I stayed in and there was respect for the the owner's wishes/restrictions 90% of the time. The 10% that wasn't respected was really inexcusable, but at least there was an overall respect. They definitely cleaned up after themselves.

Reality Shows SHOULD clean up after themselves, just to avoid the bad publicity that messes generate. There should be a little more clarity towards the owner about what they will sign off to, but the owners shouldn't be too stupid not to suspect the worst anyhow. I personally think too many owners have stars/dollar signs in their eyes when they make the initial contact with the show and then lose it completely when they get chosen. I'd just never give my home over, I'm way too suspicious of legal-schmegal stuff!

[Mo]

Bob Vila lost his contracting license over the horrific state a house from THIS OLD HOUSE was left in. As I recall, the addition was not securely attached to the house and water poured in, damaging everything.

If you watch the later shows and the stuff he's done afterward, he rarely touches a tool, he observes what the tradesmen are doing.

[Carmen]

Wow. This is certainly eye-opening! Of course, as mentioned, each show/crew is different and there are always 2 sides to the story...

[Wendy]

Wow, I once filmed a segment for a NZ show "My House My Castle". I spent 12 hours, just me and the client and managed to do 3 rooms in her home. This was with a producer, cameraman and sound engineer. These guys all vanished for a 2 hour lunch and left the camera set up for time lapse and we worked on through. They returned and asked us to do and redo stuff.
I wound up out of pocket and never paid for my time, then to add insult to injury the show never aired.
I was very naive at that stage and new to the game, so know now how better to manage the situation if it were to arise again.
The end result looked great for camera and the client is still happy 4 years later. I have the clip on http://www.organizing.tv if you want to see it. Because it never aired I can use it as I wish.

[Valerie Walker]

Wow, tough to read! I'm sure both parties could share more to explain their side. As for reality TV - yeah we only see what they want us to see. This is a shame because I do feel that these types of shows help to promote our organizing industry, however as we've all had to do, trying to explain to prospects and clients that what they see on TV is likely a very large team with a very large budget, because they want us to do it "like on TV", without the funds to support their vision. Certainly very challenging for one organizer and even for a small organizing company. I do hope this article leads to them both finding closure here, one way or another - for everyones sake!

[Monica Ricci]

Well, speaking from my Mission:Organization experience, there is NO crew, unless you count me and the homeowner as crew. :)

I tracked my hours on these shows, and there was no episode I ever did that took me fewer than 85 hours of my time. There were many nights where I stayed up late into the night painting, assembling furniture, etc. and we never left any unseen rooms filled with stuff, or left the place in worse condition than we found it.
~Monica

[John Trosko]

Great comments everyone, wow... I think the debate continues. Is this the reality of reality shows, or a case of a greedy and disappointed client?

John

[Cyndi Seidler]

I was once hired by producers of "Moving in with Pat Croce" to organize this woman's apartment. I brought a team of 2 other people and was able to take a look at the place the day before the shoot. We were to have all day to organize the living room and another day for the kitchen.

On the day of the shoot, they wouldn't let us get started when we were supposed to and we were only left with 4 hrs to perform a miracle.

As we started to sort, cockroaches began pouring out from everywhere, in everything we touched. To make a long story short, we performed the miracle they wanted and then I bailed because the producers were too cheap to have a cleaning crew and exterminator handle the bugs first. It was a nightmare and the field producer was completely an amateur.

At least me and my crew got paid and the lady got a nice living room with items placed in her garage storage.

P.S. the woman ended up filing a lawsuit against the show because the job in her kitchen was never finished.

[Megan @ Disorder2Order]

That is really disappointing to hear, especially for the family. I agree with Laurie, there really is an unrealistic expectation that comes along with those types of programs.

[Laurie]

It also creates an unnatural standard for people who want to breeze through an organization/design project! My interior design clients often want the "Pottery Barn" staged office... we all know how unrealistic that is to be upkept daily....

I must say I'm not surprised though, regarding this article.

[Ann Marie Williams]

John -- I sent this same article to my fellow members of NAPO-New England. It is just a shame.

I always tell folks that watching these shows are great for inspiration and ideas. Unfortunately, I do not travel with a group of free cute carpenters!

It is TV and most people realize there has to be "more to it." But leaving someones home in shambles is another story. A behind the scenes show special would be a fun and interesting show for people I think. Peter Walsh is always great about explaining after the fact of how many hours, how many people it really took.

Hoping that this is a rare case and the productions think about the clients long term as well as short term production time line.

[Alex Fayle]

I worked on Neat for a season and we were always very careful to leave the home owner in a better state than when we arrived.

So these types of shows can't be all painted with the same brush.

I can imagine some of them, however, are really all about getting just the right shot, without caring about the family. And I'm sure there are some families that are so irritating and unappreciative of the free goods and services they are getting that a few nicks here and there somehow just "appear". ;)

[Naomi Pollack]

Wow, that is just not right. As a professional organizer, I often find myself frustrated with the perception created by organizing TV shows that "getting organized is easy" and that a room makeover can really happen with two or three people in the space of day or so. I wish these shows would reveal more of what's going on "behind the scenes" so that viewers don't get the wrong impression about what organizers really do. Don't get me wrong, I think the designers and organizers on these shows do amazing work, but they also have large support crews. I also do amazing work for my clients, but I can't clean, organize, paint, and refurnish a room in a day... not for any amount of money. What I can do is help clients develop a realistic plan to get organized, and start implementing it. How about a "day in the life of a real organizer" show? It probably wouldn't be exciting enough for TV!