I’ve seen a bunch of them. “It isn’t in the budget” burns my @#$. These people in high priced cars show up and give a hard time to the little guy on the job because they didn’t do their homework on what the project needed prior to signing on. It’s OK if they make 30% on the carpet and paint flips, but that’s not good TV.
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As long as the cute blonde is on the show, that's all that matters to me.
Don't forget, they're playin' us.
I figure that the producers of these shows know that people get annoyed by other people looking for easy money and they know that we watch every show hoping to see the greedy lose their pants. Usually, they don't, but sometimes the do... just often enough to keep us coming back for more.
That's not to say that I don't get annoyed myself. I do. Like the show where they have 14 days to do the flip and on day 1 they're installing new windows where the old ones used to be. Holy carp, the old windows just evaporated, new ones just the right size magically appeared on site and there just happened to be a guy walking down the street who said "you want those installed?"
Reality TV is an oxymoron of the highest order.
I have had two people at work ask me to help them out on house they bought to flip.
I gave the first one a price for a reroof on a detatched garage. He almost spewed his coffee all over me,..said I was way over priced. Oh well.
He DIY the whole project. Took him six months of nights and weekends. Made $10K on it when it finally sold after another six months. Durring the whole time he tried to "pick my mind" for how to do just about everything he did. I got tired of that stuff right away. Finally told him to find someone else for his free advice. He later admitted he failed two home inspections and had to take down and rebuild a small 10x12 deck he added on one of the bedrooms (no permit and encroached on the property setback). Said he would never do it agian. After taxes and realtor fees he netted less than $7.00/hr.
The second one I turned down completely. After two years he is still trying to sell the condo he was tryng to flip. He will be lucky to break even on his investment (his words) if he can get rid of it in the next six months. After that he start loosing his shirt.
Both guys were hooked on those TV shows.
> taxes and realtor fees <
of the shows I've seen they never show all of the costs associated with the project especially the 2 you listed. In some cases realtor fees can eat up 25% of you net gain. Taxes can take as much or more depending on how you're structured for tax responsibilities.
of the shows I've seen they never show all of the costs associated with the project especially the 2 you listed.
Yes but John, then they couldn't brag about how much money they were making on the project! I used to sit there thinking, yea, your going to get X amount above and beyond what you have in it but your forgetting about realtor and other misc fees.
I've watched a few of the shows, aggravating as all get out. I wont watch them anymore, I don't like being aggravated while trying to relax.
Doug
I watch them all the time. I appreciate the guys that have done a number of them and know what they are doing and it is always interesting to watch someone bomb. Kirsten is worth watching anytime. Must be 6' tall.
My two big b*tches are they do demo on every one of them with a sledge hammer! We demo on every job and the only the the sledge gets used for is a cast iron bath tub. Any damage you do during demo is damage you have to repair later. We refer to it as surgical demo, cut carefully and remove, the bigger the chunks you can do it in the less walks to the dumpster. They never figure that out.
The other one is that most of the money on a flip is made at the buy, not the sell. They rarely say this although Kirsten does occasionally. The house needs what the house needs so buying right is where the money is. DanT
<I>The other one is that most of the money on a flip is made at the buy, not the sell. They rarely say this although Kirsten does occasionally.</I>Bingo.I'm in a hotel room for a few days, do I watched a few last night. One was Kristen talking these three guys who called themselves "The Tripod Group" or something like that.They bought a house in decent shape that only needed cosmetic work, except for new fixtures in the bathroom.They were talking about additions, complete gut in each room, etc. She kept harping that "You guys already made your money on the purchase, just paint it, update it, and get it on the market."So of course nothing got done for a week or so, because each guy though the other was "going to do it."They dug a small hole with a shovel in teh back yard, it immediately filled with water. They could hold a shovel upside-down and push the handle all the way into the groud, the earth was that saturated and weak. A ground engineer came in to take a soil sample. The soil was so wet it would drip out of his sample when he tried for a core sample 5'-6' down. The bobcat got stuck in the mud.The addition set them back about two months. When they showed the framing sitting on the block foundation, the framing was overhanging the foundation by almost 3" because either the foundation or the framing was out of square.The new master bath was ridiculously designed, poor use of floor space, poor flow, cheap materials.Short story? They went way over budget, priced the house too high, and the show ended with the house on the market for 3 months with no offers. Their potential 80K profit at the start of the show was down to about $20K at the end, assuming they got the house sold without incurring additional carrying costs.Kristen was pretty much spot-on with her advice to them. They were total numbskulls throughout the entire process.Good fun watching some of those shows. They make me realize I'm not a complete moron.
"they do demo on every one of them with a sledge hammer!"
With their 4 year old along to have some fun. No glasses and obviously no Workers Compensation Board coverage. The kitchen cabinets would come out faster with a cordless and could be left at the curb or donated for re-use.
They seem to think that the only skill a builder needs is the ability to speed up his trades. The timeline is set by financing, not that has to be done.
The people who buy seem to think everything has been fixed up, not just the stuff they can see. Hope they have some extra room in their budget for work that didn't get done.
Hope they have some extra room in their budget for work that didn't get done.
And a little more for the stuff that comes apart or was done wrong durring the fix up.
And yet, they are addictive. I can't stop watching the damn things.
I avoid them at all cost, including the Trading Spaces and Sweat Equity types as well.
Some good ideas, design wise, come up on those shows, but the craftmanship used to implement them is sorely lacking. I have finaly convinced SWMBO that jointery is the key to quality finish work, weather casework or trim, so I no longer have to listen to "they just did it this way....."
Just tell me what you want or draw me a picture. Leave the implementation to me. If I don't know how to do it I'll figure it out or learn the right way from someone that makes a living doing it correctly, not some bozo that is more actor than craftsman.
I think these shows have helped the upswing of DIY, and that is not a bad thing. But they have also dimished the value of the true professional.
>I've watched a few of the shows, aggravating as all get out. I wont watch them anymore, I don't like being aggravated while trying to relax.<
same here, there's always something better to do.
I watched a few a couple years ago and thought they were geared more as comedy shows. Flipping a house is rather boring work and there wouldn't be anything fun about watching it without contrived situations. Setting a 2 wk timetable for a 3 month project creates the necessary drama. There isn't anything to get aggravated about it though: it's show business, not real business. Bob's next test date: 12/10/07
It seems like when those shows first appeared, everyone was making money on flips, even with cr*ppy workmanship. Now it seems like 1/2 the flippers end up losing money. I don't know if its the economy, or just more realistic TV.
It really burns me that people with absolutely no experience in any kind of construction get into this line of work. I admire their courage, but I hate it when I see 1/2 azzed work being done. And then they start trying to get all the subs to do more for less $.
One show I saw had this young guy buy a house, and he planned on spending 50K on the flip. But he had NO money for either labor, or materials. And no bank would lend him money. He finally borrowed 25K from his parents, but couldn't finish the house.
I've thought about buying a house to flip, but I know that its a lot of work. And I like to think that with my 33 years as a carp, I'd go into it with my eyes wide open ,and with my financing secured.
I'm in week one of my first flip. Those shows crack me up.
I did all my homework before even making an offer. I knew what new kitchen cabinets would cost, how much for a bathroom remodel. I knew every thing I would have to do to the house, and about what it would cost, and how much time it would take. I even found out beforehand that there were existing violations with the Village. So I budgeted for taking care of those.
Those shows don't show the hours involved just meeting with the Village, making drawings, submitting plans, and getting permits.
Sure, the demo is fun, and you get a big rush seeing all that work accomplished in a short time.
They also neglect to show the realtor fees when selling (6% usually), permit and license fees, and carrying costs like insurance, property taxes, and utilities. This can easily add up to over $1,000/month here.
But, on my flip, so far so good. Haven't gotten into the big spending phase yet, but that's about to happen soon. No major surprises so far. Some plumbing issues, but I had budgeted high for that and should be OK. Two slight foundation cracks that are seeping, but $600 worh of injection should take care of that, and that's about how much I overbudgeted the plumbing.
My problem is that the wife and kid have been sick all last week, and I'm sore from the physical work, so it's hard to get going sometimes.
Oh, yeah, and one more thing nobody seems to be aware of: snow removal! It doesn't cost much, but it does take time to clear the driveway for the dumpster, and making sure the guys from Labor Ready don't slip and bust their cans. A few hours here and there makes a full day go by without any work getting done on the house.
Pete Duffy, Handyman