Anyone watching "Great House Giveaway"

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Just that really, new series recently started. I'm sure the "Numbers" are a work of fiction especially the renovation costs and "other fees".

2nd prog in series was a massive job, complete new roof, scaffolding, remove and make good upstairs ceiling and loftspace, plus kitchen, bathrooms, flooring, full redecoration, staging with furniture, etc.

The 3rd in the series was a lot simpler, no roof replacement, no staging, smaller/simpler kitchen & bathroom, just skimming and decorating throughout, and they were getting all sorts "free" from friends and colleagues. Yet somehow the renovation cost £26k.

Same with "other" costs, i.e. legal, stamp duty, loan interest, EA fees. Despite buying and selling at similar pricing, and the presenter estimating £24k for the 3rd episode, the actual costs were £36k, despite the costs for 2nd episode being around £25k.

I think their number crunchers need a new calculator!

I feel that sometimes the programme set the couples up to fail as it makes better television.
Remember the couple that were 'given' a chapel to renovate? Notorious as money pits, and usually unworkable as a home unless you have pots of cash.

Yes I agree.
This eco house in this episode is going to lose money I think.
just waiting on the result after this ad break.

I've watched a lot of these, I think the series currently on is repeats as I'm sure i've seen them before, they must have followed up the new series with repeats of the last.

Agree with what everyone says - it's a good idea, but just isn't working. Bridging loan finance is really high, loads higher than a typical mortgage even a buy to let mortgage, but a lot of these properties they go into have no kitchen and no bathroom so they wouldn't be able to get a mortgage on them anyway. Which is probably why they were in the auction in the first place. The renovators are agreeing to do it "blind", they have no idea what state the house is in when they go into it and have no idea whether it's just a quick cosmetic makeover or a new roof, damp proofing and plastering top to bottom.

The ONLY way people can make money is if they have a trade like electrician or plastering, and can blag a huge amount of freebies or massive discount on materials and things like kitchens. I also totally get why people walk away - if you are turning down paid work to stand to earn £2k in 6 months that just doesn't make sense, does it?

Also agree that if it was real world and you'd bought at auction on bridging finance, you'd be mortgaging it as soon as it was habitable, pay off the bridging loan and then airbnb / rent / let to housing assoc or whatever until the market recovered if you knew you were making a loss.

Yes it’s always the fees that kills it.
I had a nosey in the programs Facebook page today and everyone is saying the same there .
So disillusioned and negative re : the format .
There is no way to continue this show if they keep burdening the contestants with the fees and taxes etc .

Bridging finance is not just expensive,it’s also very difficult to get (In Scotland almost impossible )

Yeah I thought bridging loans were only for people who had bought a new home and couldn’t sell their own home and had two mortgages on the go , therefore had to have a bridging loan ?
The fees are astronomical in this show , usually more than the Reno budget.

To be fair the hidden costs of flipping a house are a lot higher than people realise. On Homes Under The Hammer they never mention them, which makes it all look a lot more profitable than it actually is.

Thing with giveaway is that the contestants are often given a poisoned chalice and don’t have any control over the “fees” etc, in fact often told the wrong figures. Sometimes the presenter mentions the fees at the start, and they turn out far higher by several thousand pounds.

I often wonder how many contestants walk away at the start when they have the sense to see they’ve no hope. There must be some. I sometimes scream at the tv for them to walk away when they overpay at auction and there’s nothing in it when you factor in the typical £25k of “fees etc”.

Some of the properties seem to have had some basic clearance/stripping work done when the contestants walk in, they make out it’s the previous owner, but I always wonder if it’s been given to another couple of contestants first who have started and given up when they realise the scale and cost is too much.

My heart goes out to those participants who give it their all - not all participants do - and they get nothing for their trouble.
Many of them desperately trying to get on the housing ladder themselves and their hopes and dreams dashed. 🥲

I've stopped watching at the moment. Due to the time of filming, the Liz Truss effect is spoiling the prices for so many of the hard workers on the programme.

But never mind, they've gained all this free experience!!! Yeah right.

Can someone explain this please -
On The Great House Giveaway the viewers are constantly told that the market has changed and basically the bottom has fallen out of the property market.
On the same Channel 4, on Location Location Location we are constantly being told how house prices are soaring.

🙄🙄🙄

Because the series which has not long finished features property bought in spring 2022, they are given 6 months which takes you to autumn 2022 and Liz truss. Locations filmed more recently?

Surely they must pay the contestants something? I just can't believe they would give up so much time on something they are likely to get nothing back on.

I can't not watch it, but it has become car crash viewing, sadly.

I really feel they're set up to not make a profit & I feel if the show doesn't survey it properly, they should fund the underpinning/new roof or whatever.

they choose to buy it.

North side divide. Rich versus Poor. Etc.

Most of the "giveaway" houses are in run down areas in Northern towns and cities.

Most of the "Location" houses are in the London/SE or other big cities.

Yes, the contestants will almost certainly get some form of "performance" fee as do most people appearing in TV shows.

Perhaps the contract is something along the lines of them keeping the profit if there is one, or they get a performance fee if they don't.

Sometimes, even after the final valuations are clear there's no profit to be made, one of the contestants still continues whilst the other walks away (or disappears), so I've always suspected they're paid just to stay otherwise there'd be no program if they both walked away.

Or where the contestant is a tradesman, I suspect that they can put in the bills for their "trade" work.

What is certain is that it's not all as it seems as it's nonsensical. Sometimes the "fees" are ridiculously high for a small/cheap property. Sometimes the contestant is bragging they're getting it all done for nothing from friends/family, getting materials supplied free, but at the end it's still cost £20-£30-£40k despite not doing any big work like new roof or rebuilding a side wall etc. Then you get a couple with a ridiculously low £10k budget with no trades between them, yet still manage to replace a roof, full interior strip out and replastering, rewiring, central heating, new kitchen, two new bathrooms, etc., and still come in just a few hundred over budget!

I'm convinced there are quite a few contestants who just walk away right at the start when it's clearly not going to be profitable. They're not going to televise that!

The only winners are the buyers who end up with a bargain, essentially if the houses end up back in auction

Yeah, if you knew one of these properties was coming up for sale and the terms of the show state they must sell within a limited time, even to low bids, then you can grab a great deal - all the main work done. In real life it can take a while to sell for the right price.

The ONLY way people can make money is if they have a trade like electrician or plastering, and can blag a huge amount of freebies or massive discount on materials and things like kitchens

So true. They're totally up against it. Occasionally they make daft decisions and over develop the place. The HUTH motto of keep it neutral seems to be lost on some of them.

It seems it's so hard to make a profit, especially with all the fees added at the end. The only thing they could say is they're gaining useful experience and learning skills on the job they might use elsewhere maybe. As a viewer it's quite annoying but I like to see the houses transformed.

I think the bigger tragedy is that many of these houses are left abandoned and rotting for what looks to be decades. Why on Earth havn't the council stepped in to do compulsory purchase to get them renovated and back housing people. Havn't they noticed we're in the middle of a housing crisis? They have the power to take control of long empty properties and need to start taking action.

Am I too late to this thread. I've been watching a few episodes on YouTube and it's quite interesting how many make a loss on Homes under the Hammer everyone seems to make a profit. I'd be really interested to know how the great house giveaway does their calculations. 1) To find out their max bid price 2) All the fees & 3) Reason for choosing the houses.

I'd love to buy at auction and renovate, it does seem fun but the losses are huge. So best to leave it to the professionals.

I agree, there is a homelessness crisis. They could easily go through auctions and fix places. Instead the leave private buyers to do it and then rent from them at extortionate prices.