HGTV House Hunters in Longmont

As seen in Longmont Times Call

2/20/2009

Anna and Sandra Cordova found their new home in Longmont and were featured on HGTV’s “House Hunters”. Courtesy Sandra Cordova

HGTV’s ‘House Hunters’ comes to Longmont
Longmont mother and daughter find home on national television

By Kristi Ritter
Longmont Times-Call

Sandra Cordova and her daughter Anna will never look at television in the same manner anymore, especially when they now know what goes on behind the scenes.

On Sunday the Longmont mother-daughter duo will be in the spotlight as they watch themselves on HGTV’s “House Hunters.” The show airs at 6 and 10 p.m.

For those not familiar with the show, “House Hunters” takes a look at a Realtor who is working with an active buyer and shows them three prospective homes for sale.

Local Realtor Jonelle Tucker with ERA Tradewind in Longmont admits she had never seen the show prior to being contacted. After sitting on the e-mail from the show for a couple of months, she replied to inquire into the details of their proposal. A demo tape later and they were chosen to be filmed.

“I think it will be fun for our community to see itself on national TV,” she says. “I couldn’t believe how many people were excited to know that ‘House Hunters’ was here. It was fun for me to know that people really enjoy home-related shows.”

Filming for the show started in Lyons last March, as Cordova was looking to relocate from the small community into Longmont. “House Hunters” also toured some of the local hot spots in the two areas, including dining in downtown Longmont at the Pumphouse and enjoying a cup of coffee at the Stone Cup in Lyons.

“Sandra and Anna were perfect for their role and we all had a great time working with the film crew and site director,” Tucker says. “We don’t get to preview the show, so it will be a surprise to all of us.”

Preparation for the show started on Tucker’s end by researching homes Cordova and her daughter were interested in, including condos or townhomes. Other specifics included no yard, three bedrooms, a porch, south facing to let the light in, two-car garage and a ranch style.

Tucker spent many hours prior to the show coordinating the logistics, including researching properties, scheduling access to properties for showings and filming, and communicating with and getting paperwork signed by various homeowners, homeowner associations, brokers and clients.

Cordova says Tucker’s work on the home search went beyond her expectations, even handwriting letters to more than 30 homeowners searching for the perfect property. “I’m so excited about this for Jonelle. I chose her because I knew her when we lived in Lyons and I knew she’d find exactly what I wanted,” she says.

Tucker admits that “House Hunters” is really about the client, in getting them ready to move and deciding which home works best for them. The Realtor is a behind-the-scenes person. “You can’t really be yourself as a Realtor on the show because they don’t have time for it. It’s more about the buyer’s reaction,” Tucker adds.

Interesting enough, the filming took four days for 22 minutes of live showing this weekend. While Cordova and her daughter admit it was hard work, it was a lot of fun. “What was really interesting to us was what goes on behind the scenes and the filming process, such as being fit for mics and sound checks,” she says.

Anna adds that the interesting part of the experience was looking at the property first, and then going back to talk to the cameras about it. “I definitely learned more about television, but it really taught me about my mom and me, about how well we can get along,” she says. “Doing this stuff was not easy with long days, but we never once got angry at each other. It was a fun experience.”

While the two found fun things to do while waiting on the crew, they also say they gained some new wardrobe pieces because of the filming. Cordova says they couldn’t wear black or white, or have anything with logos or writing on it, which eliminated a lot of selections out of Anna’s teenage closet, who was 17 at the time. They also couldn’t change their hair color or style drastically, as the crew came back in August to do a follow up in their new home.

“We had only moved in five weeks before filming, so it was only long enough to unpack and hang a couple of pictures,” Cordova says, adding that her son, Brett, was able to be there for the follow up filming.

Now, almost a year later, their home feels more like home with some paint splashed on walls to personalize it. And they’re ready to see themselves on national TV.

“Sandra and Anna were excellent decision-makers, had a great sense of humor, and were, overall, fabulous to work with not only for the ‘House Hunters’ show, but as my clients,” Tucker says. “There’s no doubt they appreciated their buying experience, as well as the unique and once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to be part of a national television show.”

So which one did they choose out of their three selections? Tune in Sunday night on HGTV to find out.