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Okay, I'm finally ready to publicly embarrass myself...
I constantly get asked, "When are you and Carol going to get your own real estate TV show?!?!"
Since I enjoy embarrassing myself, I thought I would provide an answer...along with a video...
As backstory, over the past 18 months, my wife and I have been approached by several production companies to do a show, and last year we signed an agreement with one of them to try to put something together. The production company convinced HGTV to send out a crew to shoot a "sizzle reel" (a short video for evaluation by the network execs). They spent four 12-hour days last summer following us around in 105 degree heat and scripting/shooting ridiculous flipping scenarios (we can now answer any questions about how scripted reality shows are).
Ultimately, we couldn't come to any agreement with this production company (let's just say there were "creative differences" -- in other words, we refuse to do just another generic flipping show like they put together in the sizzle reel), but now that our agreement with them has expired, we're talking with a couple other companies.
In the meantime, I thought I would give you a glimpse of the sizzle reel we did...enjoy!
You know, you don't need to wait for another company to give you a show. This is 2015. You can just make the show. Create it as a web series and promote it here. If it's good enough and gets the viewership, somebody will approach you from there.
A lot of shows have gone this route, starting as a web series. None in the real estate business, I don't think, but I've seen a lot of comedy series start that way.
Originally posted by @Jack M.:
You know, you don't need to wait for another company to give you a show. This is 2015. You can just make the show. Create it as a web series and promote it here. If it's good enough and gets the viewership, somebody will approach you from there.
A lot of shows have gone this route, starting as a web series. None in the real estate business, I don't think, but I've seen a lot of comedy series start that way.
We are completely ambivalent to doing a show at this point (I actually much prefer not to do one as I hate being in front of a camera, but my wife wouldn't mind a show, so I go along with it for her). Personally, I'm hoping she gets an offer to do a show herself.
Based on that, it wouldn't be worth the time, effort or cost of trying to do something ourselves. Right now, we're basically in the mindset of, "If the perfect opportunity presents itself, great. Otherwise, we really don't care."
Wow, the short "sizzle reel" recording was good! It does compare to Flip/Flop and Buying Vegas...
Good luck with your endeavor.
Originally posted by @Nancy E.:
Wow, the short "sizzle reel" recording was good! It does compare to Flip/Flop and Buying Vegas...
Good luck with your endeavor.
The crew that did the shoot has done many of those types of programs...as did the editor apparently...
Love your chemistry and I'm sure you will find the right company to produce your show! VERY impressive, good luck guys!
thanks for giving us inside glance "reality" scripted show :) when I tell people what I do for fun, they think of HGTV or some flip show. I had to explain it's not that exciting, the less drama the more profit :)
Sorta related, but I'll give it a shot. In high school I was with a MMA gym. The instructor was a Strikeforce professional fighter. He was about .500 at the time. He was a great guy. Was really close with his family and we all really respected him tons. UFC interviewed him for the Ultimate Fighter TV show (which is where a bunch of guys train and get taught by top tier pros where the winner goes to the UFC) and didn't make the cut. Pretty sure he hated it and said that all the other guys interviewing were the most dramatic and immature people out there... you know, because that's what reality TV is all about.
Safe to say all of these TV shows are a complete joke, the only reason to do them is if you want to parlay the TV show into "education" where you scam people for $30,000 at a time.
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#4 All Forums Contributor
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@J Scott nice one... liked the bunnie suits ... If you can get a show you should do it only go round once.. !!!
Much like banks. People tend to assume that these networks/production companies know what they're doing.
The reality is (much like the banks), most don't have any common sense.
They think people watch these reality shows for the drama....
They watch it for the design. They watch for the before and after and showing how a dump can be transformed.
People actually want their reality show to be real.
There's a reason why a lot of people - including myself - stopped watching storage wars after we found out the show was salting the lockers. Whats the point to that at all?
Hopefully, a smart production company will hit you up. And, hey, why doesn't BP look at doing something like that? BiggerPockets.com presents - JScott's design. Doesn't Josh have some kind of history with some tv people?
BP needs to expand a bit to tv.... Now that would be a perfect partnership there.
BP is run by common sense. Tv show showing the real world of investing - with a focus on all the fun stuff. :-)
@J Scott thanks for pulling back the curtain and revealing the manufactured drama.
We don't have cable at home, but when we are staying somewhere with cable we binge watch the HGTV and add lots of snarky running commentary. The drama isn't necessary.
I don't know if going the television show route is the best use of your talents. An architect/designer friend, back in the day when the Discovery Channel (Silver Spring, MD) was making all sorts of make over shows, was working on a pilot and the show's producers kept trying to push the drama. My friend is calm, patient, very professional and pretty much anti-drama, he wasn't what the producers/handlers wanted. They wanted to make ant hills into mountains. It would be a second job of doing stupid stuff for the camera to help amp up the drama when really what I want (TV people must assume we're stupid) is to be informed and delighted by the transformation.
You have educated us here on BP, your website and with your book. Maybe try a youtube series of a mentor mentee training showing a journey to convince the television people that the audience aren't idiots who need a soap opera with hammers.
