Helping people in all stages of their home journey.

In April of 2013, I married Jake, my college sweetheart. After DIYing much of our wedding, I started a blog to document the process.

The spark that lit the fire in our hearts and made us into serial renovators… Our first home was in Lombard, Illinois and we lovingly called it the “Cat Pee House.” Let’s just say that is pretty descriptive of the condition this house was in.

We spent our evenings and weekends renovating the Lombard house from top to bottom. Each task we did had a learning curve because we were new at everything. I like to think this house gave a us a 4-year degree in home renovation and design.

As a civil engineer, Jake worked as a construction manager. In 2017 he decided to leave the corporate world and explore a career in entrepreneurship. He started Good Morning Construction, a remodeling company mainly focused on bathroom renovations.

After finishing the renovations on our Lombard home, we realized an undeniable fact: we could never not be renovating! Following some soul searching and reflection, we decided to sell our beautiful home so we could do it all over again, and again, and again.

We had great intentions of doing a short, 6 month live-in flip… and then we met the house of our dreams which we lovingly refer to as the Hoarder House. This home was a mid-century modern dream in a wooded park-like setting, flooded with over sized windows and a whole lifetime of belongings that came with it. It took us a month of full time work to clear out everything that was left, and we began the journey of beautifying this amazing home.

Among the first rooms to be completed at our Hoarder House was the kitchen. It features gray shaker inset cabinets, gold hardware, a gigantic range and shiplap hood. Such a beautiful sight on display to view as you drive up to our home.

Since we ultimately decided that we’ll be staying at the Hoarder House for the foreseeable future, we set our sights on the next venture… the Fanchon Flip. We bought this house off market through some crazy circumstances and dove into our first non live-in flip. This was a tough six months as Jake had returned to a corporate job and I was working as an accountant. We spent evenings and weekends making this house shine.

Listing this property and getting it sold for a nice profit in October of 2019 was monumental. We successfully flipped a home in 6 months while working full-time jobs. It helped us gain confidence and assurance in our skills and knowledge of houses, design, and the real estate market.