Question: "This Old House" The Current Project
Jack
costing $$$MILLIONS! The house features all kinds of labor-intensive
details.
Who pays for this? The program, which is partly funded by our
donations? Or the home owner?
RicodJour
Not sure if your donation money makes it into the project - kind of
doubtful. There's advertising and the show promotes products,
materials and contractors - plenty of bucks in that. The project is in
Cambridge, MA and in a great section. The house hadn't had anything
done to it in quite some time. I'm not sure how long the owner has
lived there, but I gathered it had been a while, so there must have
been a fair amount of equity in the property. I don't know what the
owner does, but he went to MIT, and we all know they're loaded. Right,
Jeff? ;)
R
Dave
costs and the break down.
The home owners have to put up a certain amount (for that project it was
about $50,000) and there were some things donated to them but they had to
claim them (the value of them) on their taxes. The show didn't put any
money into the project, it only rounded up the small handful of
'donations' from the companies they featured their products for. For
example, instead of paying $10,000 for radiant floor heating, the home
owner's cost would be around $4,000 with a $6,000 figure being 'donated'.
If the home owners would have renovated without TOH, it would have cost
about $100,000.
hal...@aol.com
hal...@aol.com
hal...@aol.com
Jim McLaughlin
mentioned on the show that go to Rus Morash and his merry minions. Not
only ius any manufacturer giving away a miniscule amount of product, they
are playing a huge "placement fee" to the producers.
Not sure if any of that "placement fee" money goes into any hmeowner
project, but it does pay the "talaent", such as it is, on the how -- i.e.
"Rich" the plumbing guy, "Tom" the contractor guy; "Norm" th whatever guy,
"Roger" the landscape guy, and the "host".
Morash has made a HUGE amount of money with the franchise, and only a small
percentage of that has filtered back to WGBH and less to PBS as a whole.
--
Jim McLaughlin
Reply address is deliberately munged.
If you really need to reply directly, try:
jimdotmclaughlinatcomcastdotcom
And you know it is a dotnet not a dotcom
address.
"Dave" <da...@msungrnd.com> wrote in message
news:43D05410...@msungrnd.com...
Sir Topham Hatt
guide listing of the show describes him as a Bio-Tech Bachelor. I wonder if
there are any hamsters crawling around that house ....
Sir Topham Hatt
viewer base. How many of us could afford the stuff that is going on in this
project? And the people who can, don't give a shit...
BTW
The episode where they visted the high end gourme-=cheese shop was a total waste
of 15 mins of my precious life.
George
My buddies relative was in one of the older projects before everything
became gazillion dollar projects. He blew his budget because the
featured stuff that is placed by the manufacturers is all high end. So
he had to scale up other stuff to match.
Mikey
Sir Topham Hatt wrote:
> That home owner (George Marby) is very unlikeable and a bit of a whiner. A TV
> guide listing of the show describes him as a Bio-Tech Bachelor. I wonder if
> there are any hamsters crawling around that house ....
>
Also he must be a very rich guy. They installed radiant heating under an outdoor
walkway so that he wouldn't have to shovel it in the winter. How much is THAT
going to increase his heating cost in the winter?
Mikey
claim the donated products cost on the owner's taxes never occured to me.
Ian Pilcher
> features renovation of a modern house in Cambridge MA, and, it must be
> costing $$$MILLIONS! The house features all kinds of labor-intensive
> details.
I have the same proble with all of the renovation shows on HGTV, etc.
My wife loves to watch them, and I've got to admin that they're kind of
interesting, but watching a couple of hours of this stuff makes me feel
like an utter failure.
After all, if you can't afford a $20,000 bathroom and a $50,000 kitchen,
you're life has obviously been wasted!
--
========================================================================
Ian Pilcher i.pi...@comcast.net
========================================================================
Gazoo
"Sir Topham Hatt" <top...@sodor.au> wrote in message
news:ror0t1ht0sarpvoil...@4ax.com...
> This current house project is another example why TOH is out of touch with
> its
> viewer base. How many of us could afford the stuff that is going on in
> this
> project? And the people who can, don't give a shit...
>
> BTW
> The episode where they visted the high end gourme-=cheese shop was a total
> waste
> of 15 mins of my precious life.
>
>
or no longer bother to watch the show!!
Nancy1
The program producers get some products free (donated) or at a discount
(so their products will be shown on TV), the owner has a budget and
pays a lot of the cost.
TOH has often emphasized very large, expensive projects - remember when
they rebuilt Tommy's brother's house from the ground up? The new one
was really big. Some of that cost came from the insurance money (the
house burned down), but given the differences between old and new, I'd
say the new one was at least twice the insurance. Or the Vermont barn
they did - no expense spared, really - or the pianist's house - same
story. I think for many of these, the "renovation" budget is in the
hundreds of thousands.
N.
Default User
> TOH has often emphasized very large, expensive projects - remember
> when they rebuilt Tommy's brother's house from the ground up? The
> new one was really big. Some of that cost came from the insurance
> money (the house burned down), but given the differences between old
> and new, I'd say the new one was at least twice the insurance. Or
> the Vermont barn they did - no expense spared, really - or the
> pianist's house - same story. I think for many of these, the
> "renovation" budget is in the hundreds of thousands.
There was an early one, back when Bob Vila was the host, where the
renovated an old farmhouse for a young couple. The last few episodes,
you didn't see the homeowners any more, and at the end Bob sort of
casually mentioned that they'd planned to spend $100,000 and it had
been closer to $200,000. It came out in the paper later that the
homeowners were really steamed about the whole situation, 100 grand is
fair amount of money now, 15 years ago it was a LOT of money.
After that, it seemed like they emphasized sticking to the budget more.
I haven't watched the show in years, so I can't comment on how they do
it these days.
Brian
--
If televison's a babysitter, the Internet is a drunk librarian who
won't shut up.
-- Dorothy Gambrell (http://catandgirl.com)
BobK207
projects (if not more than one)
BV & TOH was featured in a Wall Street Journal article YEARS AGO & may
have been the beginning of the end for BV with TOH.
IMO BV was more concerned about self promotion than doing a good job
for the "client".
cheers
Bob
yourname
Probably no more than paying someone to shovel it. If you get a lot of
snow, I 'll be the radiant driveway ends up cheap.
Keith Williams
Assume:
a 20' x 50' driveway = 1000sq.ft.
6" snow = ~1" water (frozen) = 170cu.ft. ice
63 lbs/cu ft. = 1E4 lb
450 gm / lb. = 4.7E6 g
Latent heat of freezing 80cal/g = 3.7E8 cal
1 cal = .004 BTU = 1.5E6 BTU
140k btu/gallon = 10.8 gallons of oil
Unless I've screwed something up (likely) about eleven gallons of
oil or about $30, assuming no heat is lost to the atmosphere (big
assumption given 1000sq.ft. surface) and 100% efficient heat
transfer.
Now where are you going to put 700ish gallons of water that's just
ready to freeze again? ;-)
By contrast a snow blower uses about a pint of gasoline and piles
the still frozen water neatly out of the way until spring. ;-))
--
Keith
BobK207
I agree witht the basics of your post as well as the conclusion (move &
store snow in frozen form but I have always thought 12" of snow
equaled 1" of water If so you cacls are somewhat off
Also the heated walks / drives I am familair with Mammoth Lakes, CA)
are turned on when the snow starts so you're not dealing all the snow
at once but as it comes down,
So the melted water flow away via "normal drainage"
Bottom line is........... if melting snow was cost effective there
would be more snow melting insallations & few snow blowers throwers.
Last year we got 10ft in week, my fuel bill wsa high enough with a
drive melter. :)
cheers
Bob
)In article <iuaAf.16$Jn1.5@trndny01>, n...@none.com says...
- Hide quoted text -
- Show quoted text -
Keith Williams
rkaz...@gmail.com says...
> Keith-
>
> I agree witht the basics of your post as well as the conclusion (move &
> store snow in frozen form but I have always thought 12" of snow
> equaled 1" of water If so you cacls are somewhat off
IIRC 12:1 is a pretty dry number. 10:1 is dry snow. I believe 6:1
is closer to the average. Whatever, the numbers are on the weather
sites (snowfall vs. precipitation); scale accordingly.
> Also the heated walks / drives I am familair with Mammoth Lakes, CA)
> are turned on when the snow starts so you're not dealing all the snow
> at once but as it comes down,
> So the melted water flow away via "normal drainage"
But that "normal drainage" is off the path only to re-freeze
somewhere else. Some may go down the drain, some may just cause a
skating rink in the road (the towns around here will get mighty
pissed).
> Bottom line is........... if melting snow was cost effective there
> would be more snow melting insallations & few snow blowers throwers.
> Last year we got 10ft in week, my fuel bill wsa high enough with a
> drive melter. :)
I assume you mean w/o. ;-) 10'? Yikes! We had 5' in three
storms over 10 days (early December) last year. That was 'nuff.
Fortunately we didn't get much more until March.
--
Keith
Neill Massello
> I have the same proble with all of the renovation shows on HGTV, etc.
> My wife loves to watch them, and I've got to admin that they're kind of
> interesting, but watching a couple of hours of this stuff makes me feel
> like an utter failure.
There is no "reality" on television. The medium turns everything it
touches into entertainment, which usually means fantasy and bullshit.
yourname
Of course your time is not worth anything, if it is someone elses time,
it will cost more than 30 bucks, at least around here. I think the plow
companies get twice that
hal...@aol.com
whiner. A TV
guide listing of the show describes him as a Bio-Tech Bachelor. I
wonder if
there are any hamsters crawling around that house ....
Actually I think george is great! What show were you watching?
It sure isnt TOH with georges contemporary home...
hal...@aol.com
they rebuilt Tommy's brother's house from the ground up? The new one
was really big. Some of that cost came from the insurance money (the
house burned down), but given the differences between old and new, I'd
say the new one was at least twice the insurance. Or the Vermont barn
>
Contractors percentage around here is often said to be about 1/3 of the
total job cost, and had a friend with a major home fire insurance
allowed that.
so dick silvas house literally burned down and tom waived the
contractor fee or part of its 33% giving that back to his brother
towards a nicer home. meanwhile dick got lots of donations, and got
paid $ to rebuild his own home on tv.
TOH got a big show out of it.
win win for everyone and even dick silva got bit by the budget. they
installed the radiant floor lines in the basement but no boiler, it was
left for the future. there were other things like this.
frankly the big budget doesnt bug me, since its way more interesting
than cnverting a garage into a bedroom
there are lots of DIY network shows like that....
RicodJour
>
> There was an early one, back when Bob Vila was the host, where the
> renovated an old farmhouse for a young couple. The last few episodes,
> you didn't see the homeowners any more, and at the end Bob sort of
> casually mentioned that they'd planned to spend $100,000 and it had
> been closer to $200,000. It came out in the paper later that the
> homeowners were really steamed about the whole situation, 100 grand is
> fair amount of money now, 15 years ago it was a LOT of money.
>
> After that, it seemed like they emphasized sticking to the budget more.
> I haven't watched the show in years, so I can't comment on how they do
> it these days.
There were two others that got testy - the Salem house where the zoning
board made the homeowner cry, and the London townhouse where they had
to rebuild the newly installed steel roof structure due to some zoning
code or other and the budget got blown to hell and back.
I think they must write into the contract that for the owner to get the
discounts or freebies they have to smile for the camera.
R
Neill Massello
> This current house project is another example why TOH is out of touch with
> its viewer base.
Actually, they are in touch with the PBS viewer base. The show is an
example of why PBS has become irrelevant.
Nancy1
I agree mostly. However, I get tired of east coast/west coast/south.
It was explained to me by the TOH e-mail responders a long time ago:
they have to work where there is good weather in the winter, and/or
where they can go home overnight. That means east coast (go home
overnight) or west coast/south (good weather). I think they did do one
house in Chicago, but can't remember for sure. It was a new kitchen
for some family with new babies or something like that, where the kids
were eating on the floor. Anyone remember that?
In any event, they won't ever come to Iowa, Nebraska, Wisconsin,
Minnesota, Michigan, Kansas, Missouri, etc. etc. etc.
And I really miss Steve Thomas and don't like the new dorky host at
all. Ah, well. Things change.
N.
nicks...@ece.villanova.edu
> Assume:
> a 20' x 50' driveway = 1000sq.ft.
> 6" snow = ~1" water (frozen) = 170cu.ft. ice
... 20x50x1/12 = 83 ft^3.
> 63 lbs/cu ft. = 1E4 lb
5250 lb (actually less, since ice is less dense than water.)
> 450 gm / lb. = 4.7E6 g
> Latent heat of freezing 80cal/g = 3.7E8 cal
> 1 cal = .004 BTU = 1.5E6 BTU
... 5250x144 = 756K Btu, eg 756K/(55-32) = 32869 lb (522 ft^3) of groundwater
cooling from 55 to 32 F.
> Now where are you going to put 700ish gallons of water that's just
> ready to freeze again? ;-)
Back in the 4' deep x 50' long x 522/50/4 = 2.6' wide stone-filled trench
with an EPDM liner on one side of the driveway, where it can warm up to
55 F and get pumped over the driveway to melt the next batch of snow :-)
Nick
Brent McKee
I remember them both. In the case of the Salem house, a member of the
heritage board referred to the woman homeowner - who was several months
pregnant - as "waddling" into their town. I was sure someone was going
to get punched out after that incident. Of course the solution the show
had come up with to a rather serious parking problem was at best tricky
and at worst potentially dangerous.
The London apartment was a more inexcusable case. A British contractor
_should_ have known that there are severe restrictions as to what you
can do to a listed heritage building like the one they were working on
(probably class 2 - you can not alter the exterior of a class 1 building
at all). One of these is that you can't substantially alter building
profiles, but this designer decided "oh yeah, we can get away with not
replicating the original Mansard style roof and just put up what amounts
to a flat wall". Then to compound matters, nobody even bothered to wait
for planning approval. You can bet there were law suits ready to fly on
that one, particularly since one of the homeowners was a lawyer.
--
Brent McKee
My TV Blog -- http://childoftv.blogspot.com/
To reply by email, please remove the capital letters (S and N) from
the email address
"If we cease to judge this world, we may find ourselves, very quickly,
in one which is infinitely worse."
- Margaret Atwood
"Nothing is more dangerous than a dogmatic worldview - nothing more
constraining, more blinding to innovation, more destructive of
openness to novelty. "
- Stephen Jay Gould (1941-2002)
RicodJour
>
> Also he must be a very rich guy. They installed radiant heating under an outdoor
> walkway so that he wouldn't have to shovel it in the winter. How much is THAT
> going to increase his heating cost in the winter?
Not nearly as much as you might think, but in any event it's a drop in
the bucket when you're spending a couple hundred grand for a staircase.
http://www.concretenetwork.com/concrete/snow_melting_systems/costs.htm
R
D4
hal...@aol.com wrote:
> <often emphasized very large, expensive projects - remember when
> they rebuilt Tommy's brother's house from the ground up? The new one
> was really big. Some of that cost came from the insurance money (the
> house burned down), but given the differences between old and new, I'd
> say the new one was at least twice the insurance. Or the Vermont barn
They ought to change the name of the show to to "The Ultra-rich
Remodel." None of their projects are practical any more.
Neill Massello
> They ought to change the name of the show to to "The Ultra-rich
> Remodel."
I was thinking "Construction Projects of the Rich and Famous" or "This
Gold House".
> None of their projects are practical any more.
Ask This Old House is their practical program. TOH itself has become a
"behind the scenes at Disneyland" show.
John Hines
>> None of their projects are practical any more.
>
>Ask This Old House is their practical program. TOH itself has become a
>"behind the scenes at Disneyland" show.
Yes it is very informative. Especially in plumbing, where they cut open
the piece and show how it works on the inside.
This week it was water heaters, and after pulling the old one out, they
cut it open to show the insides and what they had been talking about.
Tekkie®
I don't top post - see either inline or at bottom.
> Morash has made a HUGE amount of money with the franchise, and only a small
> percentage of that has filtered back to WGBH and less to PBS as a whole.
>
>
That is why I will never donate. Also the ads
--
My boss said I was dumb and apathetic.
I said I don't know and I don't care...
Tekkie
Tekkie®
I don't top post - see either inline or at bottom.
> That home owner (George Marby) is very unlikeable and a bit of a whiner. A TV
> guide listing of the show describes him as a Bio-Tech Bachelor. I wonder if
> there are any hamsters crawling around that house ....
>
Sounds like sewage to me... bio-tech
Tekkie®
I don't top post - see either inline or at bottom.
> BTW
> The episode where they visted the high end gourme-=cheese shop was a total waste
> of 15 mins of my precious life.
>
So you are lactose intolerant ;~)
ANIM8Rfsk
Tek...@comcast.net wrote on 1/23/06 7:11 PM:
> posted for all of us...
> I don't top post - see either inline or at bottom.
>
>> Morash has made a HUGE amount of money with the franchise, and only a small
>> percentage of that has filtered back to WGBH and less to PBS as a whole.
>>
>>
> That is why I will never donate. Also the ads
And so many many many other reasons.
tra...@optonline.net
ago about how some of the projects had turned into mini disasters.
Seems it took a lot longer than anyone would have thought and the
homeowners wound up spending like 2X what they thought they would, even
with all the discounted or free materials.
Mark Lloyd
wrote:
> posted for all of us...
> I don't top post - see either inline or at bottom.
>
>> Morash has made a HUGE amount of money with the franchise, and only a small
>> percentage of that has filtered back to WGBH and less to PBS as a whole.
>>
>>
>That is why I will never donate. Also the ads
I remember listening to a PBS radio station (sometime in the
eighties). I heard a relative getting a gift membership for "Sam
Lloyd" (the cat).
--
Mark Lloyd
http://notstupid.laughingsquid.com
"Democracy is two wolves and a lamb voting on what
to have for lunch. Liberty is a well armed lamb
contesting the vote." - Benjamin Franklin
SQLit
<tra...@optonline.net> wrote in message
news:1138111469.8...@g47g2000cwa.googlegroups.com...
Years ago they did a house in Phoenix. I went to the finish party. Met the
owners, they both were worried that they were not going to be able to pay
the loans off. The project did run well over 2 times the estimated cost.
They were happy with the results, just not the cost. They also mentioned the
"donated materials" were generally the cheapest of the needed materials and
were less than 1/4 of the total bill. Both of these folks were attorneys so
money should not have been a issue.
A year later I went by and the house was for sale. It did sell for a
premium for the area, but nothing close to what the property would have sold
for with out a major street near over the wall.
myday...@gmail.com
If you have any suggestions that could help us on how to get financal help and the man power (volintures) to help us please let me know I would greatly appreciate it. Thank you and God bless you, barbara
Ed Pawlowski
> My spouse just recently lost his foot up past the ankle do to an infection. We live on his disability check and really don't have the money for renovations that has to be done for him to be able to come home. We have to make our trailer wheel chair accessable for him. His father is helping with what he can afford but his father is living on a disability check also but his father can't help with the work cause he had 3strokes a little over a year and a half ago. It's a big strain on all of us trying to get the money and help to do this.
> If you have any suggestions that could help us on how to get financal help and the man power (volintures) to help us please let me know I would greatly appreciate it. Thank you and God bless you, barbara
>
>
>
>
with that type of thing. Call the local seniour center for some tips on
who to call. The hospital usually has staff that knows of organizations
too.