A Widow Featured on "Extreme Home Makeover" Just Lost Her House
Just months after her husband's death, Arlene Nickless and her three young boys received the ultimate gift - a brand new home in their native Holt, Michigan, courtesy of ABC's Extreme Home Makeover. Today, nearly nine years later, that house is in foreclosure.
A registered nurse, Tim Nickless contracted Hepatitis C when he was pricked with a patient's contaminated needle; he fought the virus for seven years, wasting away before his family's eyes, before his passing in January 2008. Shortly after, his widow reached out to Extreme Home Makeover with a plea to help refurbish her 1860s farmhouse. Without her husband's income, she couldn't do it on her own.
With the help of over 1,600 volunteers from their community, the Extreme Home Makeover crew demolished the Nickless's old home and, in just five days, built a 3,300-square-foot, four-bedroom abode in its place. Complete with stone columns, dark wood floors and an indoor water wall, the house felt like paradise - rooms designed exactly to her sons' interests (a LEGO-inspired bedroom and an airplane bed were standouts) brought joy in the wake of the boys' impossible loss.
Adjusting to such a big change, even a wonderful one, after Tim's death was challenging: "All of a sudden there were tons of people here and then the next day, silence. Everyone was gone," Nickless told the Lansing State Journal, of the day after the project wrapped. "Having to adjust to a whole new life, and not having [Tim] to share it with - that was really hard."
Things got harder as Nickless struggled to keep up with mortgage payments - something that she doesn't blame Extreme Home Makeover for (the show has led to foreclosures in the past after property taxes and utilities skyrocketed post-reno). With the 2008 renovation came a $30,000 property mortgage (and a $5,500 property tax increase) - that ballooned up to $113,000 by the end of 2016. Nickless blames her mortgage servicer, Ocwen, which is now allegedly facing a cease and desist order from the state of Michigan for violating mortgage laws.
John Lovallo, a spokesperson from Ocwen told the Lansing State Journal in an email that Nickless made no payments toward her mortgage since the company began servicing her loan in 2011 and that the company is "committed to working with distressed borrowers to find the right solution to allow them to keep their homes."
Regardless of how the single mom lost her home - after she failed to meet the $113,00 foreclosure price, the home went onto an auction website for $176,000 - she's facing another scary period of uncertainty, alone. She was forced to vacate the house on Monday. "I feel bad because so many people came together to help us," she said. "I know I shouldn't feel like I let them down, but I do."
"When I stepped out of the house the day Extreme Makeover came, you will see me say 'I can't believe this is happening,'" she continued. "And, truthfully, that's what I feel right now: I can't believe this is happening."
Endemol USA, Extreme Home Makeover's producers, declined comment to the Lansing State Journal last Wednesday.
GoodHousekeeping.com has reached out to Arlene Nickless for comment, but she has not yet responded. We will update this story as new information becomes available.
[h/t Lansing State Journal]
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