Good morning.
[Ben] Just another day of making our favorite small town better.
-Erin, we gotta go, babe. -Go fix some old, sad houses.
Ben, let's go.
Growing up, I didn't see what was so special about Laurel.
[Ben] So every day, we make sure our girls see it.
-Good morning, Katie. -Hey.
[Ben] Can you believe we fixed up over 100 houses in Laurel?
[Erin] There's so much opportunity, so many unloved houses.
I don't know what is gonna go wrong in here today.
I'm sure something.
[Ben] Oh, a bat just flew through here.
-[Erin] That's not good. -[Ben] No way.
They're about to see the house for the first time.
-This is the best part. -Oh, my gosh!
Holy cow. Are you serious right now?
-Ben, did you make this? -[Ben] Yeah, I made this!
[Erin] The real truth of living and working in your hometown
is that you're gonna see these people
everywhere forever.
[homeowner] It's your superpower, Erin.
[Ben] Color is her superpower.
-[homeowner] It is. -This is perfect.
[Ben] Every day is different when you're renovating houses
in Laurel, Mississippi.
[rooster crowing]
-You excited? -Just a little bit.
-[laughs] -What do you think they're gonna do?
[Kay] I'm just excited to get the porch a whole new makeover.
-Maybe rescreen it. -[Tacardo] Something, huh?
[Ben] Kay and Tacardo actually grew up in Laurel and have been
friends since elementary school.
And they have been sweethearts since high school.
-You ready to eat? -Oh, yeah.
Well, I hope you got an appetite.
Oh, yeah.
-We've been trying to get married about... -[both] 13 years.
We're still working on it. We're trying to get there.
[Kay] I originally grew up in the house next door,
this house.
My dad bought sort of like an investment,
and he was gonna fix it up. He passed away.
I moved in about two years before he passed.
I didn't know it was a lot of things needed fixing.
[Erin] Kay owns the house,
but Tacardo spends a ton of time here,
and he's been helping Kay with the house
whenever he can.
They want a real proper home before they have a wedding,
and it's taken time to save the money to do that.
Every time we, like, get close, something come up.
They've helped a lot of family members over the years.
All through high school, my mom was ill.
She passed right before senior year.
I knew I had to take care of my brother and my sister.
Made sure they was going to school,
made sure they was eating,
and right after I lost my mom, then her dad, then,
my dad, then it was like... -My aunt.
-Yeah, then... -One after another.
[Erin] Whenever a family member got sick or passed away,
it was Kay and Tacardo who would step up
and take care of things.
Now, they feel like they're in a really good place
to finally take care of this house.
We have a $75,000 budget.
We're hoping that this really turns this into a home.
[crowing]
-Oh, look at them roosters. -It's late.
-They're gonna lose a crop. -[Erin] Everybody loves Tacardo.
Tacardo worked at Lott Furniture for years,
which was right by our stores. We saw each other all the time.
-[Ben] All the time. -I worked at Lott for 13 years.
Met a lot of good people.
[Erin] It was one of the --
it was the oldest store in Laurel.
They cool, man. You're gonna like them, though.
[Kay] You've known them for a long time?
-[Tacardo] Long enough, yeah. -[Kay] OK.
Tacardo is Tony Stallworth's nephew.
We're for sure putting Tony on this house.
Hey. There you go, right there.
Oh, OK.
-[Erin] Good morning. -[Kay] Hey!
-Hi. -How y'all doing?
[Ben] We're good. [Erin] We're good, stranger.
-Haven't seen you lately. -[Tacardo] I know it, stranger.
-Haven't seen you in so long! -[Erin] How are you?
-Doing good? -Yes.
We're good. How are you?
-It's good to see you. -We're good.
You too.
-[Ben] This is a big day. -[Tacardo] Yeah, yeah.
-It is a big day. -[Ben] So this is your house.
I've been here since 2012.
[Erin] Such a charming little house.
There's a lot about it that's so classic.
It's just getting a little wonky in some spots.
-Yeah. -Yeah.
-[Ben] So this house is two bedrooms, two baths. -[Erin] Yeah.
[Ben] 1,500 square feet.
-No air conditioning. -[Tacardo] None.
-[Kay] None. -[Erin] How?
-Just cool thoughts. -Trying that right now.
Tell me the things that you love about this house.
-You've had a lot of time. -I love the porch.
-Yeah. -Yeah.
It's a good porch.
[Erin] And y'all spend a lot of time there, right?
-[Tacardo] Oh, yeah. -[Kay] Right.
We pretty much off the same day on Sunday.
That's the only day we have off. -Yeah.
-[Ben] OK. -[Tacardo] And so we kind
of meet up on the porch.
To save money, everywhere we can,
we keep what's good. -OK.
But there are some issues.
-We got foundation issues. -[Tacardo] Yes.
[Ben] It needs a roof. We got bats.
[Erin] Your gable vent needs some love.
The bats have really done their thing.
It's a pain to get rid of the bats.
Most people don't even know where to begin
to get rid of them.
We have a little experience with this.
Yes.
First of all, let's just imagine
if you no longer had bats. -[Tacardo] OK.
-And we can dress this thing up a little bit. -[Kay gasps]
I love it.
-Yes? -Yes.
You still recognize it, and it's still home?
-[Kay] Yes! -[Erin] OK.
-But better. -Good.
Trying to, like, give the house a little
of a Creole cottage vibe. -[Kay] OK.
Think of little houses in New Orleans
that are this color is what really put me down the path.
Replace this gable vent and the screen door here.
[Kay] I love the door.
Maybe some color with landscaping.
-OK. -Some flowers.
Yeah, for sure.
I love plants. So I'm a plant mom.
And dig up the old sidewalk.
-Pour a new sidewalk. -[Kay] OK.
Making this front porch
into your Sunday fun day living room.
Yes.
[Erin] But keeping all of this good vinyl siding,
it saves you a ton of money.
-The best part. -[Erin] Yeah.
That really is a big focus for us,
because we wanna make
your money stretch as far as possible.
-It's gonna be gorgeous. -$75,000 is your budget.
So on the exterior, $35,000,
that's gonna cover your roof,
the paint updates, the new walkway,
foundation repair. -And air conditioning.
-New air conditioning. -Yes.
-OK. -You like it?
-Sounds good. -You wanna talk about the inside?
-[Kay] Let's go. -Come on.
-[Erin] Yes. -[Ben] Get in out of this heat.
[Kay] Yeah.
-[Ben] All right. -[Erin] Yeah.
Like, you've gone to a lot of trouble to make this
into a real room with real furniture.
That's the vibe I was going for.
-[Erin] It's not just a porch. -[Tacardo] Mm-hmm.
-[Kay] Right. -[Erin] So we will honor that.
-Appreciate it. -Yeah.
-Let's go on in. -[Tacardo and Ben] All right.
Talk about the living room and the mystery room.
-[Tacardo] Mystery room? -[Kay] Mystery room?
-[Tacardo] All right. -[Erin] Oh, man.
Whoa.
[Kay] Yeah.
[Erin] I bet you wish you had a ceiling fan in here
to move air. -I wish you had a ceiling.
[laughing]
[Erin] I don't know how you feel about paneling,
but paint would make it feel totally different.
I'm OK with it. I'm good with it.
[Erin] And once your roof is fixed,
you wouldn't have a leak ever again,
so then you could just do new sheetrock on the ceiling.
-[Kay] OK. -[Ben] But let's talk about
the mystery room, OK?
-Yes, what is the mystery room? -The mystery in the middle.
You'll see. It's more of a catch-all.
[Ben] It's a dining room.
I'm sorry, it's so hot that I have to put on my hat.
-[Kay] OK. -To get wet hair off my face.
-[Kay] All right. -[Ben] What was going on here?
[Tacardo] I set up a little date-night little scene.
-[Ben] Oh. -[Kay] Yeah.
[Tacardo] And I actually had a dining room table in here.
Dang, that's so Ben Napier of you.
-[Kay] Aw. -[Erin] Is he a --
are you a mushy, gushy romantic?
He's mushy, gushy.
When you find a good romantic man
who makes gestures
like covering the back wall in greenery
and special fairy lights to make you feel special
on a date night,
you keep that man.
I'm getting the feeling that you don't have a dining room
because maybe you don't need one.
-It's kind of like 50-50. -Yeah.
-Where are you eating food? -Where do you eat?
-Well, we have a little nook in the kitchen. -[Tacardo] Yep.
[Erin] Well, it could be a dining room again.
We have to give it an identity in here.
I really don't know what to do with that middle room,
and neither do they.
So for these two rooms, paint the paneling,
sheetrock ceiling, we want to allot 10 grand. -OK.
-But you have to eat food somewhere. -[Tacardo] Yeah.
-[Erin] This is the spot. -[Ben] Let's see the spot.
I've heard about the spot.
This is your favorite spot to sit.
-It is. -[Ben] OK.
[Tacardo] Yeah, that's our spot.
[Erin] And you want it to keep being your spot?
I love this spot. I have friends that show up...
-Friends? -...daily.
[Tacardo] Those critters.
And you, like, recognize them as the same squirrel and bird.
Yeah, they come every day. We got Oscar.
-[Erin] Yeah. -We got Heath.
Oscar and Heath showed up one day,
and they never left.
Oscar is a squirrel.
He comes to the window, and Heath is the bird.
He's a cardinal.
OK, so you can tell there's something happening for sure
in the subfloor when the tile does that.
The subfloor and joist probably have some issues.
Has this leaked? Is that what's happened?
-[Kay] Yes. -[Tacardo] Yeah.
There's a leak somewhere under the kitchen sink.
It's leaking into the floor, so it has like a sinky,
rocky feeling. I don't think that's good.
The kitchen will be the most expensive part.
It would really be all about making sure we repair
whatever has happened here.
So I think we could keep the layout basically the same
as far as plumbing, but change everything else.
So if you pulled out everything that's in this room right now,
you build new custom cabinetry.
Where your sink is now, the sink would still be.
Make room for a really economical, small dishwasher.
Hmm! I've never had a dishwasher.
It's important to save money by not moving plumbing.
That would help a lot.
And then laminate countertops would also save a lot of money.
This has gotten shabby, but you could do a new laminate
countertop that feels like something new and different. -[Tacardo] Mm-hmm.
[Erin] Then you'd have new cabinetry on this wall all the way across
with your range and your hood vent in the middle.
You'd have tons of counter space and the flooring.
Right now, the tile is cracked. We know there are problems.
We'd have to do big repairs under there.
Then I think it would save money and give it a fresh,
new look if we did roll-out vinyl.
-There are some cool patterns out there. -[Tacardo] Yeah.
We could just make the kitchen work better for you,
be more comfortable.
I just wanna get this color out.
-I know you love those like rich, moody, deep teal navies... -Yes, yes.
...and lots of natural wood. No more of this.
-No more of this. -Yeah.
For everything that we're planning on doing
with the house is about making it work.
-It'll still be a good, durable, solid kitchen... -Mm-hmm.
...but we can do it for 30 grand.
-I'm cool with that. -[Ben] OK.
-Sounds good to me. -Yeah.
That's 75 grand that gets you a new roof,
fixes the foundation,
new walkway, HVAC, no bats, a good kitchen.
Is that gonna get us to the altar?
-That should do it. -Is that gonna get us?
-What is it gonna take? -We already have a ring, right?
-Got a ring. -[Ben] OK, we got a ring.
[Tacardo] That's covered.
-I ain't gonna put that in the budget. -That's not in the budget.
-[laughing]
We really shine with a house like this.
I just love to prove the point that you can have
a small budget, a very modest house,
and you can make it beautiful. You really can.
[indie rock music plays]
[indistinct lyrics]
♪ Wo-oh ♪
All right, watch the sinkhole.
We'll deal with that later.
OK, I want to get started on the screen porch,
taking all the screens out.
And then just ceiling tiles in here, right?
Right, only ceiling tiles.
[Erin] Kay has moved out and is staying in a rental
in Hattiesburg so we can finally fix this house for good.
It's actually a pretty small demo.
Made large by the heat.
-Bat feces is gonna be big today. -Mm-hmm.
[Erin] Everything can go.
Like, even the floors and the joists
and the subfloors, we know for sure they're rotten.
[Katie] Yeah.
There's severe rot in the kitchen.
Everything is wet.
Under that tile, the tile moves.
♪ One, two, three, go! ♪
[Ben] Better not have been a mirror.
Dadgummit, I didn't need that luck.
-[Erin] I love a screen porch. -[Katie] I do too.
[Erin] That old screen is tough.
Like, I bet it was put there in 1970 something.
All these ceiling tiles have got to come down.
I'm really worried about these tiles
hitting me on the head,
so I got my hard hat on. -Right there with you.
-I do have this for you. -What is this?
-Painter's plastic? -Protection.
Because, listen.
[bats screeching in distance]
What is that?
-It's the bats. -That's the bats?
[Ben] They are right up there.
When we start pulling this down,
guano is gonna be raining upon us.
Hmm.
[Ben] We just really don't want the bat guano
to fall on our heads.
I didn't feel anything taking down the ceiling tile.
I went to a different place.
You dissociated?
I dissociated with my body so that I would not feel
what was happening to me in there.
There, started up.
[Troy] We got them riled up now.
They're gonna come down here if we're not careful.
I need them gone. I need them gone immediately.
-The smell. -I cannot handle.
-Does that make me Robin? -Yes.
We got to get these bats out of here, man.
You shine the light in the sky.
I don't know how else you would do it.
♪ Do-do-do-do-do ♪
-Huh? -That's the Batman music.
-Was it? -Yeah.
But you could hear the bats. I'm gonna go take a shower.
Yes. Please do that.
♪♪
[Erin] Today the bats have to go.
-But they're federally protected in Mississippi. -They're protected.
And they keep the mosquito population
beat back a little bit.
So, when you have a bat infestation,
you can't just exterminate them.
You have to relocate them.
And you have to call professionals
who know how to do it correctly.
Nathan, we've been demoing in here.
[Erin] Oh, yeah.
If you can imagine, the kitchen is actually better
than it was. Nothing's rotten.
-It's just dirt. -[Nathan] Oh, my goodness.
You've heard of sunken dens. Well, this is a sunken kitchen.
-Yes. -Yeah.
You wanna go to the Bat Cave?
In this scenario, you're Batman,
I'm Robin. -OK.
-Well, I like being Batman. -[Ben] Yeah.
Take him to the Bat Cave, Robin.
[Batman theme music playing]
To get into the attic, you have to go through
a scuttle hole that my shoulders touch on.
Agh, I can't!
[Ben groaning]
The roof line is there, so I had to, like...
I'm too tall. What is that?
Argh, I don't like it.
Luckily, I do Yoga.
[screaming]
Ah.
What now, Batman? Oh, gosh.
[Nathan] If you want to just angle it more towards the front.
[Ben] Oh, the bat just flew through here.
[Nathan] That's why I gave you that cap.
Look right here on the side. So they'll come out the screen.
They'll go through here where it's open at.
[Ben] Uh-huh.
[Nathan] And they'll go in and then go out.
But we'll go up there on the outside.
We'll put up a one-way valve. A one-way door is what it is.
Uh-huh.
It'll allow them to come out, but they can't get back in.
But it looks like they're coming in the front also.
-We got some over there, too. -[Ben] Shoot.
[chuckles]
Is that them in that screen?
[Nathan] Yeah, that's all them in that screen.
[Ben] Ugh.
That over there is where they're coming in the most.
And what we'll have to do is do the valve on all three
of these areas so we can get all the bats out.
So now that we have indeed located the bats,
we know everywhere they're at, he is going to put a valve
at every entrance.
And that's the little trap door thing
that the bats can fly through,
but then they can't fly back.
No more bats, no more smell.
Then they'll seal off all the gables, all the openings.
-You see all that down there? -[Nathan] Yes.
That's all their guano. That's the stuff
you don't want to stir up. -[Ben] Nope.
He said that he will come by early in the morning next week
to clean up the guano.
[train horn blowing]
♪♪
-Who's the oldest? -He is.
-How many of y'all are there? -Four.
-I'm the baby. -You're the baby?
Dadgum!
I didn't know that we had baby brother in here.
Any time you can connect
a family member to something you're building,
it's always gonna make it that much better.
What was, uh, Tacardo like growing up?
Ooh, it was rough.
Very competitive sports, football,
basketball, wrestling. -Is it still competitive?
It is. It is.
Thanksgiving is the day we meet up
and we get in the grass.
-You still wrestle? -To this day.
I wanna build a new day bed for their front porch.
I want that to stay the go-to spot.
So that house is a little bit craftsman,
so I wanna build this like a couch
that has these wide arms on it
so they can use those for, like,
setting a glass of tea down or something.
A rail across the front.
You know, the mattress would be up here.
That acts as the sofa, and then we'll put pillows
and stuff on the back and make it more comfortable.
It's gonna be the size of a standard twin-size bed.
Maybe add a little notch on the bottom just to give it
a little bit of creative detail.
And then up here on the top, I want to just add a little bit
of a decorative piece, just something to dress it up
a little bit. -But he'll have to fight me for it.
Yeah, that'd be your spot, man.
So I learned that Corey and Tacardo are really
into wrestling. Not wrestling, "wrassling."
Now you might be asking yourself, what's the difference
between wrassling and wrestling?
Wrestling is a sport.
Wrassling is just some people having it out in the yard,
but you're just trying to best each other.
If you're building a daybed for a front porch that looks out
onto a wrestling yard, it's bleachers.
It's no longer a place to sit and read and take a nap.
It's a place to sit and eat popcorn and cheer.
Who you think gonna win? [laughs]
All right, let's make some slats.
♪♪
-Tony, Tony, Tony. -What's going on, Ben?
Missed you for demo.
Y'all said y'all had bats. Not here.
-You don't do bats? -No, I don't do bats, man.
No.
Tony's afraid of bats.
Is that why he hasn't been here?
That's why he's not been here.
This is his family, and I've been wondering,
where is Tony?
Well, he's also been busy on other projects, but --
Oh, I know he's been busy. He stays busy.
[Ben] I mean, it was literally --
The floor was caving in in here.
-Put me to work. -[Tony] Let's get it.
We are putting in the new flooring system
for the kitchen.
It's miserable hot.
I don't know how Kay and Tacardo were doing this.
-Have you ever been here? -Yes.
Have you ever come and hang out?
Yes, but it was, like, in the cooler months, so...
-Check level. -[Ben] Check the level.
[Tony] Shouldn't be. Looks good to me.
[Ben] Looks good.
What's going on?
The man that we have been waiting for.
-[Ben] What's up, cool guy? -What's up?
-It's hot. -It is.
I've never been more glad to see an HVAC man in my life.
This house has never had air conditioning.
What we're seeing with HVAC, the HVAC,
is that we don't have any.
So they can start from a blank canvas,
do it exactly however they want to.
[Ben] No more bats and no more guano.
And it won't be long now. We'll be working in the cool.
It'll have heat and cool now.
[Erin] Mr. Greg, we got you a floor.
It's easier to install cabinets when you have a floor.
[indistinct]
Oh, gosh. Let me tell you something.
That breeze you feel right now, you don't feel that inside
this house. -No, you don't.
-And the air is still isn't... -Good night.
...connected to anything.
Is this the sink?
-[Ben] This is the sink. -That's it.
-Whoa.
-Nope, you got to save a space for the dishwasher. -This we have to move.
There's gonna be an 18-inch dishwasher.
It's more dishwasher than they had before.
I'm just trying to be efficient.
This house is about making it livable first,
beautiful second.
We're trying to make their budget just stretch
as absolutely far as possible.
This saves the most money to keep the plumbing where it was.
I know we usually try to put it
with a window or in an island or something, but,
in this case,
that window is their favorite spot
to sit and watch Oscar and Heath,
the bird and squirrel that live outside.
♪♪
[Erin] Paint's going up on the walls in the front two rooms,
but I have got to finalize color for the kitchen cabinets,
so I'm bringing Mallorie with me,
'cause she's got a great eye for design.
This is the thing.
We wanna be as affordable as possible, but also give her
as much design as we possibly can.
So we can be bold in the kitchen.
[Mallorie] So the cabinets are gonna be a bold color.
-[Mallorie] Yes. [Erin] Typically, if I want a bold color I'm going Valspar.
[Mallorie] Mm-hm. This is a big opportunity.
[Mallorie] Yeah.
[Erin] I think she just wanted the house to feel bright
and clean and a little more modern.
♪♪
So they have to dig up the old sidewalk,
then hopefully just get it really leveled up
is our biggest problem.
They got to level up everything.
Laramie and I are installing the laminate countertops.
People have a lot of bad things to say about laminate
only because we have since moved on to creating
more expensive and luxurious countertop surfaces,
but there's nothing wrong with laminate.
When it's right for your budget, it's right for your kitchen,
especially if it looks pretty.
Dang.
-No, that looks good. -Yeah.
This is way, way better than the laminate countertops
our mamas had in the '80s and '90s.
Kay loves the look of stone that's this color,
and she also loves butcher block.
Both of those were a little out of budget,
but I think I'm gonna do a wood v-groove backsplash
so she gets the natural wood she wanted in here.
It looks so good, y'all.
Can you talk to me about this room?
Sure.
Whatever this room is gonna be called.
-I'll come around. -Oh, my gosh.
I don't know what we call this room.
It's the dining room.
But Kay and Tacardo said
they don't really need a proper dining room.
They've used it as a lounge for date nights.
It's a place that feels cool to hang out.
We got cold air. Shut that door.
It feels so good.
This is the first time I've felt cold air
in this house.
First time anybody's felt cold air in this house.
[Erin] So good.
I finally know exactly what I'm doing.
I need a table for this room, but not like a dining table,
a banquette table. -So we're going dining room.
But smaller than that. They never used this door.
[Ben] Into the hallway.
So there will still be room to pass through.
If they were, to some reason, start using this door...
They could.
The only thing they suggested was that they would use
this room possibly for, like, date nights to make it feel
like they're somewhere special. -Mm-hmm.
It's a lounge.
Here's what I need. Here's what I'm thinking.
You ready?
We're gonna have a bench here that's longer,
a shorter bench here, the table here.
We're gonna put the light fixture over it.
And then over here, I've ordered some bookcases
that are prefab for right and left of the window.
And then we'll have a settee in the middle in front
of the window. -[Ben] What about over here?
[Erin] We can have a little space for a little storage or a plant.
-She loves plants. -[Ben] Mm-hmm.
Make this room, like, romantic and fun and playful.
And also, if they're gonna host, they can wrestle
in the front yard, but you have more seating.
Mm-hmm -- so we're calling this a dining lounge?
-Sure. -Sure.
I like that.
Guess who's coming today?
Bobby Joe.
-Did you see this before? -Oh, yeah.
So this was real thin and all broke up.
-We're gonna get it fixed. -Oh, yeah.
Well, when we get all this done,
this is gonna be a wrestling yard. -Yeah, yeah.
Sure now.
[Ben] It's their favorite thing to do.
You ever do any wrestling?
Bobby Joe has a very specific southern dialect
that's a little bit hard for those outside of our area
to understand, maybe.
What would your wrestling nickname be
if you was a wrestler?
[both laughing]
I guess my wrestling name would just
have to be Big Ben. -Yeah.
I would wear basically a one-piece swimsuit,
but with the shorts, you know.
One shoulder. Andre the Giant style.
That's you.
You know, people always compare me to Andre the Giant.
[Ben] Get a new walkway, and then when that's done,
Hunter will come back and do the fresh landscaping.
I just am ready to see some paint happen outside
and then we're gonna be looking way better out here.
-What do you think? -It looks great.
-Yeah. -Yeah?
-Yeah. -Yeah, that's great.
[Ben] This here is a junkyard dog, Erin.
-[Bobby Joe] Yeah, yeah. -That's his wrestling name.
-Are you out of the game now? -Yeah, yeah.
Well, it looks great, y'all.
We got stuff happening in the kitchen.
-19 and three quarters. -Are you measuring?
[Erin] Yes, sir.
We are working on a backsplash.
I feel confident that I can do this myself.
That is perfect.
I feel like it's something it's time for me to learn
how to do a V-groove backsplash.
Thank you.
Erin, are we going to paint these?
[Erin] No.
This is the only, like, wood moment.
We're gonna give her natural wood backsplash.
I think it'll look good if you do a light stain
all over it. -[Erin] A light stain.
Yeah, they say that you are an expert at something
when you have 10,000 hours of experience in it.
[Ben] But five minutes.
-[Erin] It's so long. -You're a quick learner.
Real quick.
Oh, thank you.
♪♪
[Mallorie] Oh, my goodness.
[Erin] Lott Furniture is closing after 109...?
-Over 100 years, yeah. -Over 100 years.
And this is like one of those --
[Mallorie] Our oldest business downtown.
-Hey. -Hey, y'all, welcome.
-Y'all been busy. -We have.
-[Keri] Hey! -Oh, my word.
Welcome to the estate sale.
Yes. This is the end of an era.
-It sure is. -I know.
The Rowells are ready to retire.
It makes sense.
So they're having an estate sale.
Y'all must have brought stuff in from, like,
all the storage -Everywhere.
Wow. There's so much good stuff.
We're doing Kay and Tacardo's house.
-That is so exciting. -[Erin] Isn't that fun?
There's still not a wedding date, though.
Don't get excited.
Well, it'll come. It'll come.
They're gonna get married sooner than later, I hope.
-Right. -And Tacardo would love
if there were pieces from Lott.
He would be so happy to have a piece of Lott
'cause he was here almost 15 years.
These bentwood chairs.
-Those are really great. -[Keri] Aren't those so cute?
-Forty. -And there's five of them.
[Keri] And they're in great condition.
I want all of those.
I think it is sad any time one of those heritage businesses
closes in town. -Yeah.
We all feel it a little bit.
[Mallorie] But also exciting, just because something new,
something fresh is gonna come.
-That's a good ladle. -Isn't that good?
[Erin] I love that dollhouse. Always have.
I feel like the girls have plenty, though.
[Erin] Yeah, they do.
What is that?
[Mallorie] It looks like -- like a gumbo machine.
Is it plastic or glass?
Lucite?
It's one of those old terrariums.
-Dang. -Do you know what I'm talking about?
-Yeah, it's vented up here. -Kay loves plants in the house.
I actually think she might really like this.
Is this crazy?
It's pretty crazy, but it's really fun and unexpected.
Her taste is a little more modern.
-I'm getting this. -Pretty fun.
♪♪
[Ben] Erin made me go up in the attic.
I've been smelling them.
Bat guano smells like mothball-ish.
It's acrid. It's disgusting.
Dang it.
-Bats are back. -[bats screeching]
Ugh.
Kay and Tacardo are coming home in one week.
[Ben] So we had to call Nathan back.
So you saw the signal?
Saw the bat signal, yeah. Saw it in the sky.
I did take a look up there, and it looks to me
that they have come back, and they are in the side
of the screen up there in the gable vent.
-Hey, Batman returns. -Yeah, I've been smelling 'em.
Well, he just confirmed it, right?
[Nathan] Yes, I did.
Looks like what happened, the screen on the backside --
-[Ben] We took your screen down. -OK.
We needed to paint it and fix it, so we took it down,
but we told them to put it on the inside.
Yep.
Once they've lived in this house for one time period,
they'll come back.
So those bats are able to get in to the actual attic again.
-Oh... -So it'll be good
to keep that screen on.
-So what happened is... -It's our fault.
How big of a gap can a bat get through?
Usually about a pinky.
They put the screen over the gable vent,
but we had not yet scraped or painted,
so we had the guys move the screen to the inside
of the gable.
Which created a perfect habitat for the bat attack.
What we have to do is just screen the front side
to where we can prevent them from going back into it,
'cause if they get into that gable
and hang on that screen,
they'll just keep going back into the attic.
Like, are we gonna have bats forever?
As long as we're able to get that front closed up
and prevent them from actually going back in
to the actual gable itself,
then we'll be able to keep them out.
Is this even possible in a week?
Bats will come out within 24 to 48 hours
after we put the valve up.
I'll be so glad when they're gone.
I hope that they're gone by then,
and I hope that the smell
is mostly gone, if it's not totally gone.
[Ben] He's gonna redo the bat valve.
He's gonna come back, and we're gonna do
a hardware cloth screen.
He'll fit it inside our trim around the vent
so that it doesn't stand out.
♪♪
See, Mom and Dad?
That's why I got this art degree.
[Mallorie] Yeah.
♪ Ooh ♪
♪♪
I am so excited for Kay and Tacardo to come home
and see how fresh and cool their house is
because it has air conditioning.
And it smells nice because the bats are gone.
I mean, it's like a different house
for those two reasons,
and you don't even take into account the way it looks.
The lounge dining room, date night spot --
Kay needed storage in there.
We gave that to her around the windows
and then the benches and the banquette in the corner.
It feels like it's a cute little cafe.
It is a dining room, but it's also a sitting room.
We've still got the little sitting spot
in the window, in the kitchen
so Kay can observe Heath and Oscar,
assuming they come back.
This house was a study in how far you can stretch a budget.
We used laminate countertops.
We used rollout vinyl flooring in the kitchen.
When you can save money on those big things,
then you can find ways
to creatively make the house feel transformed.
You know, Ben was really focused on making the daybed
on the front porch something beautiful,
something that will last and heirloom,
because that's where they always spend all their time.
It is a work of art.
Kay and Tacardo's entire relationship has been
a very tumultuous time for them with their families,
helping others instead of themselves.
The house was always
the very dead last priority for them.
And so now, maybe this changes their priorities.
Maybe they'll get married soon.
I don't know. We'll see.
Maybe one day, this house will be the Jones-Williams house.
[laughing]
-[Erin] What do you think? -I love it.
I absolutely love it.
[laughing]
-That's crazy. -Kay's leaving.
-[Kay] Oh my goodness. -[Tacardo stammers, laughs]
-It looks so good. -[Kay] Oh my God.
-Oh my goodness. -[Tacardo] I never saw this coming.
-[Kay] Oh! -[Erin] You like it?
I love it.
-Oh, my goodness. -[Tacardo] It looks fly.
Like, you can see the whole house now.
[Ben] Yeah.
[Tacardo] Man, this look good, though, for real.
-[Kay] Oh, my goodness. -[Ben] We put a roof on the house.
We rescreened the front porch. We added air conditioning.
-[Tacardo] Y'all block the bats? -Bats are outta here, baby!
[Erin] New screen in the gable.
That should keep them out for good.
[Kay] I'm excited about the sidewalk and the doors.
Yes!
Got fresh paint on the brick and the skirting
in the columns. -It's beautiful.
[Erin] To save money where we could on the exterior.
[Tacardo] Man, it looks so good.
I mean, I like the landscape and everything, man.
-It's crazy. -[Kay] Look at the yard.
[Tacardo] I know, right?
The yard was kind of just disappearing.
It looked like there had been an earthquake here.
Tacardo, you can wrestle
in the yard. -With your brothers.
Your brother Corey helped me in the woodshop with something,
and he said every holiday get-together ends up turning
into a wrestling match. -Well, I'm a little old
for wrestling, but I'm just saying.
-He said! -My knees are not made for that no more, no.
-He said. -I might give him one match.
-I'm ready to see. -Let's go.
-[Erin] Go for it.
[gasps]
Oh, my goodness!
-This is gorgeous. -You like it?
-I love it. -This is good -- yes.
[Ben] You had a daybed out here? This one is made with love.
Your brother Corey helped me build this.
-Who? -This is what I learned about --
Corey!
This is how I learned so much about your wrestling.
[Tacardo] So you're saying Corey put the pillows on the bed?
[Ben] No, no, he helped me build it.
[Tacardo] That's cool, though. That's cool.
[Kay] That is amazing!
I love the wide armrests because they're like end tables.
-You can fit a plate on it. -[Tacardo] Yeah, yeah.
-[Erin] They're wide enough. -[Ben] It's Spanish cedar,
so it will last forever out here covered
like this. -And you have screens.
The bugs will stay out.
-Sunday fun day. -...come over, stay here.
-[Ben] Sunday fun day. -[Erin] Sunday fun day.
It's back.
[Kay] Beautiful!
Yeah, but the inside is even better.
[gasps]
-Oh, my goodness! -[Tacardo] Wow
[Tacardo] This is crazy!
-[Erin] What do you think? -No way!
No way!
-[Erin] So you like this? -Is this my house?
[Erin] Yes.
-[Kay] Oh! -This is crazy!
-Feels good in here.
It's weird.
I mean, this air conditioning is the best thing we did.
[Kay] Yeah, I've never felt it feel like this. -Yeah, isn't that interesting?
-It's so cool. -It's not hot.
[Erin] You have new ceilings, fresh paint, new ceiling fan,
uncover the fireplace, and that's it.
You said that's it? This is amazing.
-[Tacardo] Like it ain't nothing. -That's it.
[Erin] Oh, there's way better.
-No, no. -[Kay] Oh, my goodness.
The lounge. Date nights.
-Go see. -What?
[Ben] We're calling it the lounge room.
-[Tacardo] The lounge. -[Erin] Yeah,
because it's kind of a dining room.
[yelps]
-Oh, this is amazing. -OK.
And you can invite family over for dinner,
but it's also like a sitting room.
But you really needed storage.
[Kay] Oh, my.
[Erin] Lots of storage over here because I could tell you were
struggling to find storage. -[Kay] With cabinets.
-[Ben] Mm-hmm. -[Tacardo] Yeah.
[Erin] So we did these bookcases beside the window.
Aw!
Who are those people?
[laughing]
And then the banquette is all storage.
You can lift that up and put things inside.
Oh, OK. I love it.
[Ben] This table, Josh and I built it in the shop.
This was Erin's idea. She kind of designed it.
[Erin] I just want it to be a really pretty
little cafe table. -[Tacardo] It is cute, though.
But it didn't take up the whole room.
-So you could still use this... -[Tacardo] Oh, yeah, that's perfect.
...door if you want to.
Still not technically a dining room.
-It's a lounge room. -That's what I was gonna say --
it make the whole room look, like, bigger.
[Ben] Pictures from the fair.
What's up with you and Ferris wheels? -[Tacardo] That's sweet.
We love them.
Well, that's, kind of, when we first started dating.
The fair is in town this week, so...
-We should go. -Yeah, y'all should go -- yeah.
-This is my favorite. -[Erin] You like it?
[Kay] I love it. Can you tell me --
I don't know anything -- Nope.
-But I'll try. -[Kay] OK.
[Erin] We found the terrarium at the Lott closing sale.
Felt like it was kind of like your vibe,
your plant-lady vibe. -Yeah, I love plants.
-[Kay] I love it. -[Erin] Yeah?
And then we got these little chairs
that I thought were so pretty. -Yeah, I recognize them.
-[Erin] Yeah. -[Tacardo] Awesome, for real.
[Ben] With the windows being open like this,
nothing in front of them, you can sit here now
and watch for Oscar and Heath.
[Tacardo] No. You didn't.
[gasps] Wait a minute.
[Ben] Oscar and Heath built their own houses
while we were here. -[Erin] Isn't that amazing?
-[Kay] They built it. [laughs] -[Ben] Yeah.
[Erin] We scared them off, I think,
'cause we haven't seen them.
And so I thought if we get them cute little houses,
maybe they'll come back. -They'll come back.
[Ben] Which one's Oscar and which one's Heath?
-Show you when they come out. -[Ben] Oh, OK.
-[Erin] Oscar's the squirrel. -Yes.
-[Erin] Heath is the bird. -[Kay] That's right.
-[Ben] OK. -But you still have
your spot. -I'm excited.
[Kay gasps, laughs]
-Wow. -Yo.
No.
-You see this? -This is crazy.
-Yeah. -A little better?
-This is crazy. -A little better?
What? Are you serious?
[Erin] It's different, Especially --
-[Kay] Yes. -[Tacardo] Way different.
-This area was about to just sink and fall. -[Kay] Yeah.
Hold up. No, no, no.
This isn't our kitchen. No, it's not.
-No, it's not. -[Erin] This is so your kitchen.
[Tacardo] Look how wide open it is.
They opened the whole kitchen.
Cousin Tony came over, and we took everything out
and then rebuilt.
[Erin] We did have to take out the entire floor,
all the joists, the subfloor... -[Kay] Oh, yeah.
...everything, because it had leaked from the sink
for so long that it had spread everywhere.
-Cousin Tony. -Cousin Tony.
And he and I did the v-groove backsplash.
He taught me his ways.
You wanted teal kitchen cabinets.
[Ben] You wanted wood accents.
-[Erin] You wanted some natural wood somewhere. -[Kay] Yes.
But it never looked like this in my head.
[Erin] You've got laminate countertops,
sheet vinyl floors.
I feel like it achieves the look that you were kind of after.
This is amazing. Is that a dishwasher?
Yes, it is, Kay.
That is your very own dishwasher.
And it's small, but mighty.
-[Tacardo] This is crazy. -[Kay] It is.
Tacardo can just sit here and talk to Oscar and Heath.
[Erin] Sure, sure.
[Ben] Instead of having to wash dishes.
And here's your spot.
So when Kay is cooking,
you can still hang in the kitchen.
As nice as it feels inside, let's go sit
on that front porch. -[Tacardo] Yeah.
[Kay] Wow, wow, wow.
[Erin] Are you so glad to be home?
-I am. -[Erin] Good.
-Y'all, it ain't a Sunday, but... -It feels like one.
-It feels nice. -Feels like it.
Please keep using your front porch, though.
[Kay] I am.
Even though you have air conditioning.
This is where we have Sunday fun day at.
[Tacardo] Yeah.
-You gave us $75,000 to work on this house... -[Tacardo] Mm-hmm.
...which is a tight budget. So we had to be smart about it.
-[Erin] With a lot to do. -[Tacardo] It's real good.
-[Kay] It's real good. -[Erin] Good.
-[Kay] I love it. -[Erin] Good.
I feel like this has been something that was just like
the last priority... -[Kay] Yes.
...on the back burner because everything
and everyone else was your first priority. -Yes.
I hope that this can be a happy, fresh start.
-Something new. -Yes.
One last thing.
-We had $13 left over. -What's this about?
Conveniently, the cost of a marriage license
in Mississippi. -[laughing]
-[Ben] That's how much it cost. -Woah!
That's right. That's right.
Tacardo, don't go to the fair tonight
and blow it on corn dogs.
Blow it on the fair as well.
I don't think we got enough for a corn dog with this.
[laughing]
It's been four years.
Ha-ha!
[Erin] Our friend Michael McKinnon is an architect in town,
and he's asked us to come back and finish this building.
But we are coming back
under very different circumstances.
[siren wails]
What happened was probably the worst thing I could have,
you know, fathomed.
[Erin] We were seeing pictures of this building up in smoke.
I mean, it was billowing out of this area
that we had just finished.
You know, part of me hopes it goes back to what it was.
Do we feel super solid about this plan?
Nope. That's what makes it a good one.
[Erin] Michael's taste is totally not my taste,
but we can't just do
English country houses every day.
I need to call this building complete.
-[Bleep] y'all. -[laughing]