'Extreme Makeover: Home Edition': The Fifita family's 'neighborhood YMCA' home gets a much-deserved facelift
It's a new episode on 'Extreme Makeover: Home Edition' with the design team — Darren Keefe, Breegan Jane and Carrie Locklyn along with actor Jesse Tyler Ferguson coming together to give the Fifita family from Hawthorne, California, a much needed and well-deserved reward in the form of a complete makeover for their house.
Brian and Lisa Fifita along with their five children live in an 887 sq ft house. Despite the space constraints, the family never shied away from taking in children who were homeless and hosted them with the utmost respect, providing them with food and a roof to spend the days and nights, giving them and their house the reputation as the neighborhood YMCA for taking in children and young adults.
The Fifita family belongs to the Tongan community upholding the community values of always giving and helping the ones in need. The family was nominated for the makeover by none other than Brian and Lisa's niece Kina, as a way of saying thank you to the family and their house that served as a safe haven for many kids who had difficulties in their own homes and had nowhere and no one to turn to.
The family had always watched and loved the show and they were completely taken by surprise when the giant 'Extreme Makeover: Home Edition' bus rolled up to their house.
They were overcome with emotion when they saw that accompanying the crew was a crowd of 200 something people comprising their friends and family along with volunteers of the Tongan community and this crowd later went on to support the makeover each step on the way.
Coming back to the house, the family had lived in it for 17 long years. Their living room doubled up as their family room, dining room and the office as well when required. The dining table was pushed against a wall and was not of much use, the couches were smashed together and half the furniture was inaccessible.
Then there was the kitchen that was completely in shambles given the wear and tear it endured over the years with food being prepared for huge groups of children. The plumbing situation in the house needed work and so did Brian and Lisa's daughter Nancy's room.
Nancy is homeschooled and she had a very small room which she would describe as "10% room and 90% closet" with her crouching under her closet whenever she needed to shut out and study. Brian and Lisa's room didn't have a closet and they used plastic containers to store all their clothes.
One of their sons was living in the outhouse due to less space and all they wanted to be was for all of them to live under one roof. Also, the backyard had a lot of unused space and required a lot of work.
With the Fifitas moving out temporarily for renovations, it was now time for the design team to come in who had their work cut out for them.
The primary concern was space and the team solved it doubling the area of the house — they changed the lighting situation with modern and sleek fixtures. For the backyard, they added a pergola, an outdoor dining space and also created a basketball court for the kids to entertain themselves.
A butcher top marble counter was added to the kitchen which was almost double in size now. Brian and Lisa's room got beautiful rich apple chocolate finish wooden closets. A room was equipped with computers, a TV, an X-Box and drone to give access to technology to the kids.
After a month-long makeover, it was now time for the family to come and see the transformation. Joining the design team along with Tyler Ferguson and the 200 volunteers were the mothers of Brian and Lisa. Brian was very emotional to see his mother as she was battling cancer and was out in public after a very long time.
After thanking everyone, the family moved inside to see their house and their happiness knew no bounds to see the makeover. Going from an 887 sq ft house to now an over 1600 sq ft modern Polynesian island retreat styled house, the family's excitement went through the roof.
Catch all the new episodes of 'Extreme Makeover: Home Edition' on HGTV every Monday at 8/7 c.
