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June 21, 2019 3:42 PM   Subscribe

What It’s Actually Like to Be on House Hunters Twice "For starters, we already had a house. It just got weirder from there." [Slate.com]
posted by readinghippo (46 comments total) 14 users marked this as a favorite
 
I've known HH was basically faked for a long time but I think I actually enjoy it more. It becomes closer to house/location porn and less making fun of silly buyers who are obsessed with granite or wall paint color (because they are coached to be that way). And it's still fun to peek into the lives of home buyers, like guessing the jobs of a couple buying a multi-million dollar second home in Sonoma Valley.
posted by muddgirl at 3:49 PM on June 21, 2019 [8 favorites]


Wow. I've been hate-watching Tiny House Hunters on Hulu (mostly, I get sad/frustrated at all the people who as far as I can tell, don't really want or need to live in a tiny house, it's just that housing is too damn expensive most places), and if anything this makes it feel a little better?
posted by epersonae at 3:50 PM on June 21, 2019 [3 favorites]


Hi, my name is Keightlinne and I'm a teacher for elementary school-aged horses, and my husband Brillpad shouts at eggs parttime at the co-op. Our budget is $1.2 million.
posted by gc at 3:55 PM on June 21, 2019 [136 favorites]


For those who haven't seen this previously:

@HouseBudgets
HUSBAND: I launched a Kickstarter for smart canapés
WIFE (cautiously): And I run a startup for donkeys
BOTH, IN UNISON: Our budget is $2.9 million

posted by Homeboy Trouble at 3:58 PM on June 21, 2019 [61 favorites]


My parents actually got a call from one of these shows who wanted to film their house as one of the houses the couple would be looking at -- because my parents bought a house that has a complete 1950s diner in the basement. Because the guy who built the house loved 1950s diners, and when he retired he decided the diner, which only seats 18, wasn't big enough, so he moved closer to his daughter and built himself a new and bigger diner.

Anyway, the location scouts for the show had seen my parents' house when it was listed for sale, before my parents bought it, remembered it, and got in touch to ask if they could film in it. My parents declined, but it was a teeny inside glimpse!

(My mom had been going to redecorate the basement diner, but it turns out to be super-fun for grandchildren and for parties so they're sticking with it.)
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 4:08 PM on June 21, 2019 [62 favorites]


I want to see HH with historical figures.

His Eminance King Louis XIV - the Sun King - is looking to downsize from Versailles as he looks to retire.

KL: It was quite costly pursuing the War of Spanish Succession to secure a Bourbon on the Spanish throne. It wiped out quite a bit of my immense personal wealth. I'm looking for a modest ranch style home in or around Nashville.

5 minutes into the episode...

Realtor: This home has enough space install a helipad so that you can continue to entertain foreign and domestic dignitaries, but the property taxes ar-

KL: TAXES?! TO WHOM? I AM THE STATE!

posted by Groundhog Week at 4:13 PM on June 21, 2019 [74 favorites]


I guess the biggest part of the show this knowledge ruins is that it's usually obvious which house they are going to "pick" - it's the empty one. Except in House Hunters International.
posted by muddgirl at 4:15 PM on June 21, 2019 [6 favorites]


I knew it was fake, but I had no idea that the participants were paid so little. I thought surely they'd be given $5000 at a minimum -- not $500. That's nuts.
posted by Annabelle74 at 4:41 PM on June 21, 2019 [29 favorites]


I wish to subscribe to Groundhog Week's channel.
posted by Gyre,Gimble,Wabe, Esq. at 4:43 PM on June 21, 2019 [5 favorites]


I want to see HH with historical figures.

That sounds like a delightful skit for a Hugh Laurie-type comedian. I'd watch.
posted by tautological at 5:21 PM on June 21, 2019 [3 favorites]


I met a producer of a minor RV-themed show in the Keys. The happy family traveling around in different RVs was actually the family of an executive at the network, and they stayed in hotels every night.

He then asked me if there was a good bar nearby. This was near Long Key, so I said sorry, no.
posted by RobotVoodooPower at 5:22 PM on June 21, 2019 [9 favorites]


I presented a reality TV show in the UK twenty years ago (long story). Watching any allegedly non-fictional TV show now is like watching a magician's act from behind; once you know what they're willing to fake, you can see how almost everything is fake. The TV folks I worked with weren't actively deceptive or manipulative and had a modicum of sympathy for the non-professionals they were working with, but the characters on the show are absolutely seen as audiovisual putty to be massaged into whatever shape the narrative arc of the program needs.
posted by ntk at 5:52 PM on June 21, 2019 [11 favorites]


I want to see HH with historical figures.

I just want to see John Calvin shout “I am predestined to buy this house with the cute breakfast nook!”
posted by GenjiandProust at 6:09 PM on June 21, 2019 [25 favorites]




ntk, I think that’s why I like Drag Race so much — most of the queens are professional performers and so they’re more in on the act and less produced than on most reality TV. (The show also hived off its big bitchy group discussion segment to its own show so that helps I guess)

“Our camera guy was fastidious about shots. We had to hit marks in the house to get different angles of basically the same conversation.”

LOL so you had to... do basic mechanics of acting? While shooting a TV show?
posted by sixswitch at 6:34 PM on June 21, 2019 [3 favorites]


Yeah, the real pleasure for HH for me (besides location porn/interior design nosiness) is seeing how well the couples can act. Some of them are so wooden and terrible, it's hilarious! Others are much more natural in pretending to dither/see flaws/obsess over a bathtub, etc. From this I like to extrapolate how I think long the couples will stay together. When it's an individual hunting, I guess how long they'll actually stay there or if they're secretly in a relationship, like the woman on HHI who was moving to the Maldives and the "friend" showing her around totally ended up her BF by the "three months later" scene).
posted by TwoStride at 6:49 PM on June 21, 2019 [2 favorites]


Too bad the timeframe isn't right, otherwise I'd ask you, ntk if the show happened to be Escape to the Country. A Canadian station has picked up the series (for what I'm guessing was the equivalent price of a stick of gum) and has been running it relentlessly. I wouldn't care except some elderly relatives of mine have taken to practically binge watching it, and oh my does that show drive me utterly insane.

The houses never meet the specs the so-called buyers tell the hosts they want. I use the term so-called buyers because the people on these shows (both this one and the international version, Escape to the Continent) never (with one exception) actually end up buying anything. The exception I've seen was a teacher who got a job in a different part of the country and was forced to move just before the start of the school year, and (if you can believe the show) apparently purchased one of the houses she was shown.

To make matters worse, a stupidly large percentage of the people who claim to be looking for houses says they want the properties so they can start up B&Bs or camping/yurting facilities, but when you listen to them, they have no skills or experience in running B&Bs or camps, and they don't actually want to do any work. I guess it's some kind of on-trend fantasy or something.

I can barely express how much I've come to despise these shows.
posted by sardonyx at 6:54 PM on June 21, 2019 [8 favorites]


Around 2005, my wife and I "starred" in a now-defunct HGTV renovation show called "New Spaces."

AMA!
posted by SoberHighland at 6:59 PM on June 21, 2019 [6 favorites]


I have actually wondered about this, mostly because if they actually took that long to decide in some of these markets, they would lose the house. I also wondered how much they paid to film the houses...which now I wonder is nothing?
posted by corb at 6:59 PM on June 21, 2019 [1 favorite]


That Twitter account cracked me up. Various:

WIFE: I have a twitter bot where I analyze jam sandwiches sandwiches

HER: I work part-time as a gila monster worker

THEM: I have a podcast about funeral doom
posted by Conrad Cornelius o'Donald o'Dell at 7:09 PM on June 21, 2019 [1 favorite]


This week on Pocket Dimension Hunters...
Prima: I tend the husks of those infected by the spores of The Dreamer.
Consort: I serve as Purger to his Unholiness.
Them: Our budget is three unblemished souls of the spawn of Tsathoggua.
posted by um at 7:30 PM on June 21, 2019 [30 favorites]


Our budget is three unblemished souls of the spawn of Tsathoggua.

That wouldn't even get you a starter Deep Void in Austin!
posted by thatwhichfalls at 7:35 PM on June 21, 2019 [17 favorites]


We've been watching Escape to the Country as dinner chill out viewing and GODDAMN do I have opinions about barn conversations.

Also, every episode with Nicki Chapman:
House Hunters: Our budget is £350,000, but we could go up to £400,000 for the perfect home.
Nicki: With a budget of £400,000...
HH: Uh, excuse us...
Nicki: (Shows three homes, cheapest of which is £425,000)
posted by robocop is bleeding at 7:46 PM on June 21, 2019 [8 favorites]


biscotti and I have sometimes thought that House Hunters, for all its stupid fakery, is actually kinda important in that it has always portrayed gay and lesbian couples as boringly normal. Here's Bob and his partner Joe and they're looking for a whatever, and it's not a big deal that they're two dudes, and look, they're just folks. Is this just crazy cishet thought?

Also we do kinda want to be on the show someday so that we can be the official World's Most Horrible People. I think we're just the pair of repressed wasps to pull this off.
posted by GCU Sweet and Full of Grace at 8:19 PM on June 21, 2019 [11 favorites]


It's not just the barn conversions (but please do share your thoughts on those). Just tell me you've got opinions about...what's the phrase?... I think it's "open fires." No, they're not open fires. They're wood-burning stoves.
posted by sardonyx at 8:23 PM on June 21, 2019 [1 favorite]


For those who haven't seen this previously:

‏ @HouseBudgets


See also: SNL House Hunters -- at least there's room for his man cave.
posted by filthy light thief at 9:21 PM on June 21, 2019


LOL so you had to... do basic mechanics of acting? While shooting a TV show?
posted by sixswitch


These ain t exactly SAG pay rates. When I was press ganged into an episode of What Not to Wear, I was not paid at all, like the Realtor in this story.

I refused to block or whatever, just as a matter of principle. They gave up after 3 days. In the end, i was trying to avoid being in the episode at all.
posted by eustatic at 9:36 PM on June 21, 2019 [9 favorites]


When I was press ganged into an episode of What Not to Wear,

I think we need to hear more about this!
posted by TwoStride at 9:48 PM on June 21, 2019 [8 favorites]


Some interesting insights into HH -- I knew that parts of it are staged, of course, but didn't realize just how much of it is staged.

Nevertheless - it's still fun to watch. Don't know why it's so fascinating to see different types of homes in various communities/states/countries, and noting differences in things that I'm sure to many people are trivial or mundane. Placement of laundry washing machines, for instance.
posted by davidmsc at 9:56 PM on June 21, 2019 [1 favorite]


strangers plied him with alcohol until he passed out and when he regained consciousness trinny & susannah were gently suggesting that with those hips he might reconsider the pleats
what about press ganging do you not understand
posted by um at 9:57 PM on June 21, 2019 [25 favorites]


I start from the position that nothing on "reality" shows is real, I don't know how anyone could think otherwise, and I really don't care about the people and the story lines, so all these House Hunters reveals are not that shocking. I just want to see the houses, really just the ones in other countries and cities in the U.S. I've never been to. I would love a show where people just toured houses for sale, or just people showing off the houses they live in. The drama part of it is a waste of time and annoying.

The drama part is what ruins all of these shows. Just remodel the house, or do the makeover, or whatever, skip the weird playacting.

But mostly I think...let's just say differently, about the people that want to be on these shows. I have had different friends and acquaintances that have tried to be on reality shows and it's always in the back of my mind, I can't look at them the same.
posted by bongo_x at 1:57 AM on June 22, 2019 [7 favorites]


I think I had my reality show epiphany reading Ben Elton's Chart Throb, which is pretty broad and obvious satire but planted the idea that reality TV shows don't have to respect anything. The call-in votes are an expensive survey but there's nothing that says they have to respect that result if the producers think it should be otherwise.

On the other hand, I remember a season of Big Brother where the viewing public kept voting off the most annoying people, so the final two weeks were the four most pleasant, but banal, contestants. In hindsight I'm a little surprised the producers didn't manipulate the results.
posted by Merus at 5:03 AM on June 22, 2019 [2 favorites]


This week on Asylum Hunters...


...

Shit. nah. I can't do this.
posted by ardgedee at 5:18 AM on June 22, 2019




I love Escape to the Country because of the landscape scenes. Otherwise...all the houses have been rehabbed in some way and the kitchens are modern. Just give me the long shot of the garden and beyond!
posted by andreap at 8:26 AM on June 22, 2019


In hindsight I'm a little surprised the producers didn't manipulate the results.

I'm almost certain that the FCC has strict rules against that. (I remember American Idol got around the regulation with the "Judges' Save.")
posted by dances with hamsters at 10:03 AM on June 22, 2019


Here it is:

Section 508(a) of the Communications Act of 1934 (47 U.S.C.. § 509(a)) provides that it is unlawful for any person, with intent to deceive the listening or viewing public:

(3) To engage in any artifice or scheme for the purpose of prearranging or predetermining in whole or in part the outcome of a purportedly bona fide contest of intellectual knowledge, intellectual skill, or chance.


There have been at least 18 occasions since 2010 in which Section 508 has been invoked to investigate radio and television stations for violating their own rules or the FCCs rules for running such promotions with complaints ranging from stations ending voting prematurely to not correctly tallying the votes.
posted by dances with hamsters at 10:30 AM on June 22, 2019


Always wanted to hear first hand accounts of "reality" shows. Sure, the brain knows that much of it has got to be staged, yet the production is just good enough to make you think that it must at least be basically true. I would love to hear more behind the scenes from shows like Survivor and Amazing Race, for example.
posted by blue shadows at 1:03 PM on June 22, 2019


I would love to hear more behind the scenes from shows like Survivor and Amazing Race, for example.

They are competitions with stakes, so they fall under Section 508. With Survivor, what I've heard is that before any of the games, the crew demonstrates them thoroughly to the contestants so they know the rules completely.
posted by NoxAeternum at 1:21 PM on June 22, 2019


Anyone else remember The Joe Schmo Show? The basic idea there is that they wanted to do something like The Truman Show without the massive human rights violations, so the environment which they were putting forward as real when it was all an elaborate sham was presented to the subject as... a reality television show. The big problem I had with the conceit is that what was being put forward was already an extremely heavily mediated presentation of reality. The big reveal basically boiled down to telling the subject that this scenario which he had thought was maybe 80-85% artifice was actually 100% artifice.
posted by jackbishop at 7:03 PM on June 22, 2019 [1 favorite]



This week on Asylum Hunters...


Here you go
posted by FirstMateKate at 10:05 AM on June 23, 2019


This contradicts my suspicion that 100% of HHI couples get divorced.

Have to check back in a few years, I guess.
posted by Chrysostom at 10:44 AM on June 23, 2019


@Merus I think I remember that season. That was season four, right? And by the end they all refused to undermine the others, and for subsequent seasons the producers specifically recruited for die-hard manipulators who would throw their grandma under the bus for a chance at being the last one standing.
posted by Tailkinker to-Ennien at 12:36 PM on June 23, 2019


I love Location Location Location here in the UK but one thing that drives me nuts is when they find a home under budget and Phil or Kirstie frame it as extra money. Like if their budget is £300k and they find a home listed for £280k they say something like “and it doesn’t hurt to have an extra £20k for renovations.”

Unless they’re cash buyers this doesn’t make sense to me?? It usually just means a lower mortgage as their deposit will go further. I don’t see where they magically get £20k in hand?!

The other show that makes me laugh is “A Place in the Sun” where they take Brits abroad to something like Spain or Greece to find a home. But of all the episodes I’ve watched I think only 1 couple ended up actually buying a place and I feel like they’re just in it for a free holiday? (I’m assuming the show pays for the trip but I could be wrong)
posted by like_neon at 6:36 AM on June 24, 2019 [1 favorite]


That first one drives me nuts too, but here in the US they do have a few different types of home renovation loans where you basically buy a house for $x but get a mortgage for $y = $x+estimated cost of renovations, and since you are qualifying for $y, lowering $x would increase your reno budget.
posted by muddgirl at 9:12 AM on June 24, 2019




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