'Love It or List It': Travis and Drew choose to keep their house after Hilary Farr gives them their dream kitchen
'Love It or List It' featured same-sex couple Travis and Drew. The former, a real-estate instructor was at loggerheads with his elementary school teacher partner about the house they'd lived in for the past 11 years with their 3 dogs. Their 1,700 sq ft ranch-style home was not big enough for Travis while Drew believed that this was their forever home. Travis's biggest issue with their home was the kitchen. He and Drew are huge entertainers and he said it would require them hours and hours of prep work that they'd to do way in advance before their guests came. The reason for this was the kitchen that was closed off and cut off from the rest of the house. Their laundry room was in the kitchen as well, eating up space. Apart from that, he also found his hall bathroom ugly, however, Drew said that none of the problems around the house were unfixable.
The couple enlisted the help of show hosts, realtor David Visentin and designer Hilary Farr to help them decide if they'd 'love' their existing house or 'list' it on the market. One being asked what it'd take for Drew to consider moving to a new home, he said it would be an open concept kitchen and living space, three bedrooms, two offices, a great deck and a nice yard. He also mentioned that a place no farther than a 20-minute drive from his office would be an added plus and would make moving out of their existing house easier for him. The budget that was allotted to David to find them a new home was 3,55,000.
Coming to Travis, he said it would take a completely renovated kitchen, a dedicated laundry space, an updated hall bathroom, a second office and the entire flooring and painting across the house to be updated, for him to choose to stay back in his existing home. The budget for this renovation was $115,000 which Hilary was quite sure about being enough for the project. However, in a house that been lived in for 11 years with almost no major renovations, chances were that concealed issues might crop up during the renovation process and the budget that looked ample in the beginning might not be enough. This proved to be true for Hilary during this renovation and her contractor mentioned that they'd at least require $15,000 more to carry out the renovation entirely. However, the couple didn't have any more money to spare and after major thought, they decided to take out the hall bathroom renovation and an added office space from their requirements, for their existing house. In return, they were looking for a spanking new kitchen because that would be the only saving grace after slashing off two major needs from their list.
This was a huge setback for them considering the fact that even if they tried to list it on the market, the updated bathroom and added office would be a bonus and would help increase the value of the home. In the end, all their worries were out of the window after they saw what Hilary had managed to pull off. Apart from the renovations, Hilary and her team had done up the place with better lighting fixtures and brought in new furniture. The house looked absolutely magnificent and Travis and Drew believed that the kitchen indeed compared to none. They had loved the house that David had found for them and he was able to tick all the boxes as far as the couple's requirements went. The only drawback was that it was $14,000 above their budget and in the end, it was a no-brainer that they'd choose to 'love' their existing house and not 'list' it.
