At least "This Old House" doesn't have an arbitrary time limit. And it occasionally deals wth real engineering issues. The ones that bug me are the ones that renovate a house prior to selling it...like "Love it or List it". The whole premise is something many real estate experts say us a bad idea. And they tend to encourage bland renovations to "depersonalize" a house.

Actually, I'd love to see a show built around an engineer.

I'm one who likes 'This Old House'. From what I've seen they do quality work, with top of the line materials and components, and yes, I'm sure that those companies get recognition for providing their over-priced products gratis, or for stiff discounts.

The one that I couldn't stand to watch (or contemplate--and I warned my children never to do to me) was the show that had 'unsuspecting' homeowners go out to dinner and a movie, while their kitchen was completely remodeled before they returned, later in the evening. Crazy. The crew explained that as much of the work as possible was done off site, before the episode was filmed, but no way would I want them rushing to finish my job in a few hours.

My late husband disliked HGTV--and most of the home improvement projects it inspired in our home.

Love it or List It and Property Bros. are just the same show over and over. I got bored after the first couple episodes.

What bothers me are the remodel prices. They always seem too low. Also, on Flip or Flop, they always make such rapid decisions on tile choices, paint etc. I think it gives the impression that it is super easy to do. I have never seen a Flop on that show...so maybe it should be called Flip or Flip?

Still, it's fun to have the variety of shows. You just have to take it all with a grain of salt.

If you pay attention, the show usually airs before they sell it. They give an estimate of what the new value is. No idea how good that estimate is...we don't know if the property actually sells, and for what.

Contractors on construction websites generally can't stand the unrealistic budget and timeframes portrayed by these shows.

Bad ''advice'' is so endemic on entertainment TV that it would be much more difficult to call out the good advice.

IMO,Cuban Chrome on Discovery is far more intertaining with a dose of modern history thrown in. Watch for HGTV copy catting a series depicting blue collar couples maintaining and improving their homes. There's likly little demand for such "real life situations"since majority of people prefer identifying with wealth over reality. There's a reoccuring phenomenon here on Houzz where people become giddy talking about colors with catchey names. I tip my hat to marketing ginius but have reservations about individuals unwilling to use paint unless it carries a romantic name.

I dislike the inevitable "oh no, we just found a major problem" Excuse me, but how long have you been in this business and you still haven't learned to look for the potential issues before they jump up and bite you? I have seen my share of truly hidden issues but I've also seen lots of times people were wearing blinders to avoid seeing the problems lurking.

I also agree with the comment about rushed color choices on "flip or flop"...why would anyone choose a color from a little paint sample and then expect it to be right? You might hope it to be right, but I would never hand over the paint and walk away until I see it applied

Nothing wrong with This Old House, real contractors, real problems & solutions. The mechanical room in one of their recent houses was AMAZING, one boiler with like 4 radiant heat zones and also heating a hot water tank, all copper lines and very well organized. I am sure they are quite expensive to hire. Some of the things they have done on their whole house projects would be crazy expensive, probably pre-agreed to by the homeowner. Some of the costs may be supplemented by advertisements. They dont discuss the costs for a reason, that is not what the show is about. It is about how to's and new products. I think the last one I watched they helped a homeowner install a door correctly jambs and trim included.

Holmes while his budgets go pretty crazy, the cost is also supplemented by product advertisements on the show, have you noticed they push certain products over others? I am sure he inflates the prices displayed as to what it would cost a normal person, it is not what HE is actually paying. I feel most of the pros he hires work for a discount for air time to advertise their brand. As far as education, you can learn quite a bit from the show if you pay attention, it is much more educational than love it or list it. You learn what is wrong and why its wrong. Gives you some red flags to look for when buying a house. Of course they make some things look worse than they are for entertainment value, that's just something to take with a grain of salt.

The 'rehab gal' hires out pros for various trades (electric, plumbing, engineering) and doesnt show it most of the time, she mostly does the finishing of the home which is what they air. The one house she had to lift up to redo the foundation, obviously hired out and showed that on the show. She did limited work on the foundation they stuck her in the bobcat for a few shots.

Renovation Realities I have seen on DIY channel is actually quite entertaining and realistic. The budget and timeline are pretty much always way off, and often they dont finish and end up hiring someone instead of DIY'ing it. The entertainment value is there watching them struggle and problems that arise.

These shows have production managers, etc, plenty of editing, and other red tape. Some shows are better than others when it comes to real life situations. When it comes to real life budgets, I agree everything is not as it seems. Not all shows are equal and I agree some of those crash projects are kind of risky but they do have a lot of people on the job at the same time which can make it go a lot quicker.

Completely unrealistic time-frames.

Unrealistic budgets arrived at in a number of ways, including:

-essentially free labor

-allowances, considerations, and discounts given to the shows because of marketing/publicity that would never be available to the typical consumer.

Poor workmanship often, quickly done.

Then, there are the general philosophical differences with which I disagree, but have become pretty pervasive, and I see these thought processes in the Houzz/Gardenweb threads:

Many people now seem to be on the lookout for the cheapest materials that look the most impressive, fancy looking hollow core doors, plumbing fixtures, and door hardware.

People are building 4000 square foot houses and then looking for privacy interior knob sets for under $15 and doors under $50, and then they are looking for the cheapest labor to execute it all.

The most expensive things in my project are the labor and plain, but sturdy (sometimes commercial-grade) doors, windows and hardware. The single most expensive individual things (taking into account the relative cheapness of the available possibilities) have been the closet hinges, the pocket door mechanism, and the interior door jamb assemblies, none of which anyone will probably notice let alone think are glamorous.

I like the fact "This Old House" occasionally focuses on the engineering.

One problem I've noticed is the huge focus on luxury kitchens. Luxury kitchens look great in pictures on HGTV (and real estate ads, and garden web) so I think they get over-promoted. I've noticed people on this site getting nudged towards bigger and more expensive kitchens and bathrooms. Ironic when people cook less then they used to...chances are your grandparents cooked more in a kitchen a fraction the size. I always suspect a lot of folks are skimping on really important structural stuff so they have the money for those kitchens. It also strikes me as odd when people on "House Hunters" treat a kitchen island and granite countertops like they are just as important as 30 minutes more or less commute time or $100,000 more or less price price. If I was looking for a house, I'd be focusing on location, size, cost, and whether I thought it was well made...counter top materials wouldn't be on my radar.

I think the cheap but pretty doors are the nature of the shows. The "payoff" is the "After" pictures at the end of the show. The producers of the show don't care if things fall apart in a few years. This is one reason these shows advice have to be taken with a grain of salt.

First time Flippers is one that drives me nuts. Young adults buy a junk house cheap with a very low budget and no clue how to do anything. That they finally get the thing on the market is amazing. Some don't sell, though and I'm always wondering what a buyer thinks if they recognize their house on the show.

It's entertainment, and you can get ideas. This one is not on HGTV, but the dude helps people who's restaurants are about to close. Kitchen Disasters. It's a formula. They all have a formula. What I like is I can go online and see if the restaurants have really changed or closed. We visited one in Ventura on our last trip there. I think they are slipping into their old ways. It was Greek, and their Ovgolemono soup was too think and flavorless to eat. I sent it back.

One other thing, even on the shows that weren't too bad (I haven't watched in years), is lack of context. One room, considered in complete isolation from the rest of the house, and redone in the latest trends, and having no relationship to what the rest of the house looks like.

It ends up often like walking out of Dorothy's transported house in black and white and out into OZ in technicolor.

One of our neighborhoods has an annual house tour and one of the houses has been on it three times with two different owners. It is two, small early 19th c. houses combined, and part of it is still charming. But the latest permutation has a racetrack shaped kitchen with radiused cabinets at one and and a matching banquette at the other, with super glossy cabinets, and wild granite, topped on the second floor by this multi skylit spa bath which is multi level and has a glass box multi person shower that you expect to see a bunch of naked Bond girls lathered up in. Not only are these two rooms completely out of context with the rest of the house but the renovation stops dead right outside the kitchen and bathroom doors. There is a battered old louvered door on the linen closet with a $1.00 pull from the hardware store on it, right outside this $50,000+ bathroom. It makes no sense in a historic house of this size, and the rooms make what should be a charming house look shabby and rundown except for these two renovated rooms.

That comes back to the fact that pouring all of your budget into a trendy kitchen and master bath is trendy. In a real estate listing they would probably just show pictures of the bathroom and kitchen.

I don't mind Property Brothers, primarily because they aren't focused on selling the house at the end of the show and making a profit. But, I don't like the majority of shows that claim that you can put in X dollars of work and get almost double back when you sell the house. I suspect those shows that have free labor (almost all of them) and discounted goods can do that, but the average home owner won't see those sorts of returns.

And others have commented I think it gives many homeowners an unrealistic idea of how far their money will go. One day I hope HGTV has a show that focuses on homeowners who get a shock when they get a bid for the work, and then someone teaches them how to save money by doing some of the work themselves.

"someone teaches them how to save money by doing some of the work themselves."

I think the problem with some of the shows has been that they have convinced homeowners that they can do work themselves because "it's easy, anyone can do it!", and lots of homeowners just can't. They don't show the actual process and details. There used to be shows that actually showed people how to use tools, (New Yankee Workshop, and This Old House, to some extent on the older episodes anyway), where it would take an entire season to build a piece of furniture or a building project.

People don't have the attention span to watch something like that anymore.

What this also does is convince people that don't want to do it, that when they hire professionals to do it that since "it's easy, anyone can do it!" is that the professional is charging way too much.

I had a client who balked at spending $400 on reupholstering a chair (which was a good price for a shaped chair with a bit of button tufting, hand sewn, dart-like seams) because she had seen them cover chairs on Trading Spaces and all you needed was "a little fabric and a staple gun".

I told her that I would pay for it before I would let her ruin the chair. She had done some very basic DIY (painting and hanging shelves and pictures) and it was all incompetently done. But after watching some TV while reading a magazine and doing chores and talking on the phone, she was convinced she could do it because the pros on TV told her so.

The more useful list (and so much shorter) would be of good advice given on HGTV.

Casey

Pal what you said is spot on and can be seen here on Houzz daily. People asking how to do something that requires years of apprentaship to learn. I don't know which is most unrealistic ,their asking or takeing them by the hand to lead them in deeper. Time and again I've attempted rallying interest in teaching novices how to do projects over the course of a week,month or time frame required. Each interested party would have a project to work on. Example,refinishing painted furniture or doors would start with a discussion on determining type and condition of existing paint lasting one week. Secound week's discussion focous on removing known as well as unknown possable contaminates and preping the surface. It would take time but would show several idividuals how to do it right. As it stands,that same instruction is expected to be covered in 4 or five posts which is imo,unrealestic. Sadly people aren't interested in investing that much time when they can watch a single one hour tv show on gutting and remodeling an intire house, Maybe even learn how to sell it for a profit as well. LOL

"...shower that you expect to see a bunch of naked Bond girls lathered up in."

palimpsest:

Uh, what's the date of the next house tour, please.

I agree that rebuilding your bathroom in a weekend is ridiculous and some of the work I've seen done is horrifying. That flipping show drove me nuts the two episodes I watched. I can't imagine ever wanting that cheap cr*p in a house I lived in. I've also learned many things that are useful. You need to pick and choose what you watch.

I've learned a lot from Mike Holmes. Some things I thought we'd never use, like weeping tiles. Now that we have a house in an area that actually gets rain, that is just the thing that will probably solve the drainage issues between us and the downhill neighbors - still checking it out. Unlikely to ever need to do anything related to ice dams, but still interesting.

You know those tile leveling systems? I saw those first on MH and we used them when we re-tiled our tub alcove. Yeah, they're pushing a product, but I was happy to see such a thing existed. We went with the cheap ones from HD since we were doing a one-off. Our 12 x 24 tiles came out great.

In our old house we installed our own kitchen cabinets, which we learned how to do between the TV and the internet. We weren't fast, but we were perfectionists. The stone guys said they couldn't have been better for their purposes.

We think our electrical wiring in this 1964 house has been "improved" by the previous owner who didn't have a clue. We'll get an electrician to assess for us. Why? MH and a few others like Income Property beat it into our heads that this is important and we just don't know enough to get it done properly ourselves. It looks bad up there in the attic. Is it? We'll find out. We also think every electrical connection in this 1900 sq. ft. house should probably be on more than 2 circuits. OTOH, we have no problem changing out the old outlets and switches.

Then there's Sarah Richardson who had a lot of good things to think about regarding fabric selection and use.

Just for laughs, here is the "professional" way studs were found in 1964. We pulled down the paneling off the family room wall today and found this Honestly, each of those hammer whacks is a stud. (The cardboard above covers an HVAC air return we're vacating.)

I liked This Old House, when Bob Vila was the host. He was so much more fun to watch! Yes, he was a bit annoying at times, but he had those homeowners WORKING! Now, most of the work is done for them and seems like one long advertisement.

Rehab Addict...she's not a contractor, but I admire her attempt at inspiring preservation of older homes. Especially in economically depressed neighborhoods with affordable housing. Rather than tear it down, she saves them and resells them. Sometimes inspiring others to renovate their old houses in that area.

That's how This Old House started...older homes in Boston that were going to be torn down. New is not always better, IMHO.

LL, Rehab Addict is much more likely to save old house parts than This Old House now days and you are so right in that new is not always better. As an old house owner, I can't stand to watch This Old House any more. I like Rehab Addict and most of what I have seen on her show is fine with me. I also have great respect for her message.

Diane

Do you remember that great old farmhouse, from the 1700s they had with Bob Vila? It was a wonderful home, but they made all the original rooms parlors and dining room....and added on a kitchen, breakfast/dining and family room.

I was so disappointed! They could have added a few feet to the existing kitchen and had a lovely space. Then the homeowners quit working and they paid someone else to finish. Bob Vila mentioned that a BUNCH of times....it was pretty funny. I mean, wasn't that one reason their home was chosen?

Now, they don't even attempt to get the homeowners very involved. Back when they did...my favorite house they did was the Cape Cod! Everyone had the great accent and the husband's (uncle?) did the plaster in the house. And when Bob Vila asked if it needed to be sanded, the guy almost fell off his ladder (LOL) "Sanded, Bob????" He was shocked, at the mere thought!

Like most TV programs things must be done fast and w/lots of hi-drama stuff going on.

The time frame and costs are very frustrating to see... like how could they do that? why can't anyone around here do that, for that? I can see why contractors, designers and builders etc would have a big problem with that!

As an antiques lover/seller I always laugh at what they find at yard sales, or the dump, beside the road... are you kidding me? No where I have ever lived could you count on that. And the constant tips on getting things at big discounts... GRRRR! As a horse person and dog person I often see many issues with movies n etc, when you get to specifics they are not accurate... including things that just don't work or are so far off from reality. Storage Wars... any of them... Dr shows... OMG

I do find them entertaining and love to see what they change and how. Also the interactions between all the 'players'.

I don't think they detail out things to the extent we would like, and wonder how long anything will last. For those that are selling or flipping homes I doubt those things matter (to them).

The couple from Texas that finds homes for potential buyers, then fixing one up. Am liking their work. I suppose I have really liked each show at one time or another taking the good ideas, design and whatever in and understanding the cons as per TV. Have learned none of it can be done in those parameters around me... dang it!!!

Scott and Amy Yancey of Flipping Vegas make me feel sooo inadequate. Complete renos of Vegas low-end boxes in two-three weeks tops at labour costs I can't come close to in the land of $11.25 an hour min. wage.

Seriously though, Amy has a fabulous eye for contemporary design and a decisive vision for each reno. It shines through all the obviously staged drama of manipulated shouting matches and looming deadlines.

My husband normally can't stand anything on HGTV but he enjoys Chip and Joanna because they are from Waco and we grew up in central TX just south of there. I think they do honest work...you see the same crew people from show to show and while I think some episodes are doctored for drama--like a load bearing wall or a plumbing they weren't aware of, for the most part I think she does give good value for money.

Nicole, I admire her commitment...she is doing the work for lot of what happens there...unlike Property Brothers who are just pretty faces. Even the Cousins are maybe not as technically strong as I though after reading about a lawsuit filed against them.

the shows I really enjoy are with Scott from Canada who helps people renovate homes for a rental apartment...always forget the name. He does quality work-and while homes are staged so lovely the home owners couldn't afford to buy dThe furniture...he makes smart design choices with his work.

also like the Vacation Home for Free where people buy and renovate 2nd homes with Matt Bladishaw...think he has good feel for what works for that type of property although I often wonder how people are doing a couple of years down the road...

follow ups would be great

IMHO they all have something to offer... ideas, something to (perhaps) relate to, always an unknown problem (how true!), interactions between people, extending our scope n comprehension... and entertainment! :D

Imagine 100 yrs from now all the half baked DIY remodeled homes our offspring will see.

Ill tell U what, Craftsmanship is alive and well and I plan to take it to the next generation while all the knuckleheads watch TV. LOL

There is also the fact that on "House Hunters" some of the houses that are shown on TV are not even for sale. The buyers are looking at their friends houses, etc. There is a part of any show that has to be scripted, but don't be to invested in what you see on HGTV, because it's not to be taken too seriously!

K Sissy "because it's not to be taken too seriously!"....

As in pretty much anything on TV... consider your sources, right? After all it is a source of entertainment, which often needs some added spice! :D

The news is even slanted to ones cause for the most part... but that's another whole story WE DON'T want to get into right???!!!

Told you so...

Love It Or List It sued over shoddy renovations, ridiculous falsehoods

"Actually, I'd love to see a show built around an engineer."

I have engineer friends, but if I find out a potential customer is an engineer, they go on double secret probation immediately. While I'm not stereotyping, many engineers think they know much more than they really do.

I'm getting a tooth implant on Friday. I would never tell my surgeon how/what to do. Give me the knockout dope and I wake up with an implant. Not so were I an engineer. I'd have to know the compressive and tensile strength of jawbone and various other minutia, then tell my surgeon how to do his job.

Hey, I'm an engineer!

I don't think I've told my GC to do anything ... well, except maybe some project management stuff, e.g., I spend time figuring out what the city wants so he doesn't have to.

He probably spends more time (that I pay him for) explaining things to me, both because I like learning and because that way he can make sure I know what the choices are and that I get what I want. He's big on me making informed decisions, which I appreciate.

The reason I said I like the idea of a show built around an engineer is because I find the bones of the house can often be what gets short shift amidst all of this obsession with kitchen design.

Yeah. The flashy/faddish stuff get all the airplay (this is TV after all) and then the more subtle stuff gets ignored. Heck, even the not so subtle stuff gets ignored. It doesn't show on TV, so ...

"We'll replace this window." "Uh, okay" People will obsess over the color of a granite and then ignore who the window came from and what it was made out of/what the profile looks like/how it fits with other windows = the cheapest thing out there. Won't be around this winter, let alone in 5-10-20 years, so ...

Though I'm not sure that's as much as engineer thing as a craftsman thing.

FWIW, I'm a Not So Big House (sort of) fan, so it's not surprising that the 4000 sf comment above made me laugh.

To be fair, if you do dive in and want to do a good job, it's a pretty big undertaking. Mostly people probably prefer not to know/have other things that interest them more.

Slightly tangebtial...

I'm not into TV but I like to watch random peoples YouTube channels of their DIY home projects, or small time professionals trying to make a name for themselves.

I like See Jane Drill and Ron Tanner. They and This Old House taught me how to plaster.

I also like to read blogs about bathroom guts, residing, plastering, and so on.

My wife is watching the television show "Fixer Upper". I learned from the show's expert that one can discern a load bearing wall by tapping on the wall in question. If the studs sound "mushy", they aren't bearing any weight and you're good to go for a tear out.

I thought you guys would appreciate this time-saving tip.

HA well... it 'might' be a start...

http://www.msn.com/en-us/lifestyle/home-and-garden/6-upgrades-under-dollar1000-that-give-you-the-most-bang-for-your-buck/ss-BBrJyr3#image=1

lol at that advice. found it on front page of msn

did you know you can redo your kitchen, redo a bathroom, redo your flooring, and repaint your house for less than a grand each? lolllll.

I have to admit, I've been watching some of these shows for the last week or so. I don't normally get HGTV or the other cable channels that have these shows but now that I'm staying elsewhere during my remodel, they're easily accessible.

I feel like I have a morbid fascination with them.

One of the things that always stands out is time. Not just how quickly (they say) they get things done but what they do when something takes longer than expected. In the first part of a show, they'll obsess over "this tile" or "those cabs" and then when something eff's up, that's right out the window so they can finish "in time". Wrong color? Throw some (on site, fast) paint or veneer on it.

Which matters more: a couple of weeks of delay (as if ...) or the long term?

'Course, the shows would be less interesting without this drama. I mean, people watch (watched? I never did ...) Jerry Springer. There's some degree of Jerry Springer in many of these shows. I doubt that's by chance.

I suppose the root concept of this thread is those people that aren't aware of the parallels between many flipping/remodeling and, say, pro wrestling. The description of that is not so very different: "The content including match outcomes is choreographed".

I actually really like Rehab Addict. She is into restoration, and uncovering what some dumbass covered up years before. There is nothing sadder than seeing a 100 yr old house where someone "modernized" it by taking out all the built-ins and replacing the old light fixtures and putting in wall to wall carpet. Carpet can be removed and floors refinished but dang, those built-ins can NOT be easily duplicated. Not many houses have that level of craftsmanship anymore.

I have a friend who bought a 1910 bungalow with adorable cross-hatch windows everywhere BUT the dining room... where the previous owner had begun the process of replacing all the cross hatch windows with metal frame windows. Ugh, ugh, and double ugh. Luckily, they stopped at the dining room and didn't get any further.

I could tolerate Rehab Addict a lot more except her voice gets to me. I agree at least she's trying to preserve what was good with the old. It just irks me to no end when shows like Property Brothers or Love It or List It go into an old house and paint over gorgeous old quarter sawn oak for example. Really????

The core premises of the shows is to make a house look sparkly and good fast for resale or renting. Slathering paint on everything and knocking down walls yields fast results and are things an unskilled homeowner can do. There are systematic biases in these shows that we should be aware of.

There are systematic biases in these shows that we should be aware of.

Such as?

None of what they do bothers me. I generally like the end result.

Ichabod Crane: Such as a bias towards things that give a quick visual "pop" in the "Before and After" pictures, vs. things that improve the livability of a house. Nothing gives a quicker visual contrast then a coat of paint and a few knocked down walls. In shows that revolve around an imminent sale or rental (eg "Property Brothers" or "Designed to Sell".) there is a bias towards bland renovations or "of the moment" renovations that will look horribly dated in 15 years...not the problem of the show or the seller.

I like the look of the "After" pictures...but if I stop and think about what they will look like after a few years of life I sometimes cringe.

I would say that knocking down walls is not something an "average" homeowner should perform. Once the wall is down, things generally become more complicated. Also, homeowners, we suggest that you invest in hiring out drywall finishing - it's an art with a steep learning curve. It is very tedious and small flaws are magnified once paint is applied. As a pro, even we hire out whole-room or more drywall finishing. What will take you weeks with a fair to medium result, will take them days with a flawless result. It is money well invested on a surface you will see on a daily basis.

Who said should? I said could. As for the difficulty of adding drywall....that's part of why these shows are more prone to remove walls then add them...

You have to remember how much different a flipping house show is and This Old House, and their audiences. I'm not seeing any 'bad advice' (in the shows I've seen). Just common sense stuff; paint and slight improvements to sell. Bad advice is like the Home Depot commerical I saw once where the guy brings in the picture of this huge treehouse, and the HD guy says "you'll need this" while handing a circular saw to the guy (who looks at it like he's never seen a saw).