Flipping Shows Thrive Even in Down Market on HGTV and TLC
You would think that when the housing market fell out the home fix it shows and home flipping shows would have seen their ratings drop. Well, we were wrong.
Home flipping shows have increased to over a million viewers an evening. The tone of the shows have changed with less than glorious endings for some of the participants, but the shows continue to be the darlings of the cable box.
It does make sense in a way. Such a large percentage of Americans own homes now and the dream of remodeling is the fodder of pillow talk. To dream about remodeling and improving ones home is in our DNA and these shows do feed the fantasy.
The audiences for HGTV and TLC, the two channels with the most so-called property programming, have grown steadily over the last three years. The reason appears to be their shift in focus away from buying real estate as speculative sport to more educational and emotional shows.
“If anything, there’s more interest than ever before, because of what’s going on in the market,” Jim Samples, the president of HGTV, said.
HGTV’s prime-time schedule — built around the shows “Designed to Sell,” “House Hunters” and “My House Is Worth What?” — now average more than a million viewers every evening.
Shows that were hallmarks of the bubble — like “Flip That House” (on TLC) and “Flip This House” (on A&E) — are still around, but have been retooled with less-than-happy endings. The TLC episodes are repeated several times each week and still draw an average of 700,000 viewers a showing. via NYTimes.com.
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Post from: The Real Estate Bloggers
Flipping Shows Thrive Even in Down Market on HGTV and TLC
Source: HGTV
