A PARTICIPANT on The Great House Giveaway has described how she had never even touched a drill before deciding to do up a “house of horrors” on the show.
25-year-old Nia Jones found herself partnered up with roofer Mark Hughes during her time on the Channel 4 show.
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The concept of the programme sees the strangers handed a house which has been purchased on auction to improve within six months in order to make a profit.
If successful, the duo can share any of the profits made on the house between themselves equally.
On the programme, hosted by Simon O’Brien, the pair were presented with a dilapidated £158,000 in Angelsey.
They then had a budget of just £35,000 and six months in order to whip the house into shape.
Nia and Mark transformed the home into something echo-friendly with under floor heating, thermal cladding, solar panels and an electric car charging port.
They also opted to ditch traditional heating methods for something much more sustainable.
Speaking about her time on the show, Nia said: “I think I went into it quite naively thinking there wouldn’t be much to do but it was a huge project to finish within six months.
“The eco side of things was the straightforward part. It was the traditional building issues that slowed us up.
“There were definitely a few points where I felt that it was unlikely we’d finish at any point – let alone within six months.”
33-year-old dad-of-three Mark was also left admitting he was close to “quitting” as the pressures of dealing with the house built up.
He said: “When I walked in on the first day, I said it was the house of horrors! I thought to myself ‘I’m quitting, I’m quitting, I’m quitting’!”
“Everyone was saying ‘even if it’s not the about the money, it’s an experience at the end of the day’ so once I started to think of it like that, I cracked on.”
Thankfully for the stranger duo, the house was valued at £300,000 just shy of double the amount they purchased it for.
Deducting the initial £158,000 and the £35,000 in costs, the pair were left with £107,000.
This meant they received a payout of £53,500 after signing up to the programme.
The Great House Giveaway looks set to return for a brand new series on Monday after a slew of previous success stories.
So far the show has broadcast four series after first launching on Channel 4 in 2020.
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