Realty.com

Extreme Makeover: “Scaled Back, Really Cheap” Home Edition

Posted April 25, 2010 by Matthew Denton

The long-running show is changing its approach.

Remember when we featured Extreme Makeover: Home Edition’s failure to sustain the elation of families who came back to find extremely opulent houses of their own?

Here’s a sample report:

But this could all be a thing of the past. The thousands of news reports that lambast the show’s inability to be sensitive to the family’s capacity to sustain living expenses in such grand houses already made an impact to the producers.
The Wall Street Journal reports, “The average size of current makeovers is 2,800 to 3,000 square feet. A 2005 episode featured a house in Lake City, Ga., that became a 5,300-square-foot English castle boasting five bedrooms, seven bathrooms, five fireplaces and an outdoor kitchen. These days, the houses appear more subdued, eschewing over-the-top amenities. A swimming pool is no longer a must, unless it could be used for therapy. When pools are built, the show explores a well system to help reduce water usage and costs. Lavish landscaping is out, working with the local environment is in.”

Finally, they’ve come to realize what happens in the aftermath. Those mega-sized homes that are heading to foreclosure only became symbols of failure and distress in the industry. Such homes are not needed by these ordinary folks who are more than happy to live their ordinary lives.

And while the producers and sponsors of the show are at it, why don’t they feature homes that are budget-friendly and require fewer expenses to build? They can even tap recycled materials for the construction and even design.
I’m sure that would encourage more homebuyers to demand from their builders to pattern their homes after what they saw on the tube.

Realty.com is a real estate search portal, dedicated to connecting home buyers and sellers to trusting real estate services. Follow the Realty.com blog for up to date housing news and trends. And monitor local mortgage rates at RealtyGadget.com.