HGTV is in need of its own refresh.
Falling linear ratings, the rising cost of materials needed for home renovations, the threat of further price hikes due to President Trump’s tariffs and the rise of the DIY TikTokers have all hit the Warner Bros. Discovery cable network like a slab of Italian marble to the face.
It has emerged over the last few weeks that the Warner Bros. Discovery cable network has canceled at least seven shows including Christina on the Coast, starring Christina Hall, The Flipping El Moussas, starring Hall’s ex-husband Tarek El Moussa and his new wife Heather Rae El Moussa from Selling Sunset, Battle on the Beach, Farmhouse Fixer, Married To Real Estate, Bargain Block and Izzy Does It.
Christina on the Coast, which ran for five seasons, Bargain Block and Battle on the Beach, which both ran for four seasons, Farmhouse Fixer, which ran for three seasons, Married To Real Estate, which was just nominated for a Daytime Emmy and Izzy Does It, which was canceled after only one season were all home-renovations shows.
“Home reno shows are expensive because all of the materials are jacked up and on delay, the price of wood and marble and everything else is going up so these shows don’t make as much sense anymore,” one source told Deadline.
“Stuff wouldn’t arrive on time; we had wood floors, for instance, that would come in six weeks after we started production and then we’re also depending on contractors. Everyone knows if you’re doing construction on your home, you never come in on budget. So, try to apply that to a show that has really strict budgets,” one producer who makes renovation shows for the network told Deadline. “Some of our episodes took 16 weeks to shoot; it’s a more labor intensive than doing a real estate show.”
Deadline understands that these HGTV home renovation shows can cost up to $500,000 per episode compared to real estate shows, which generally come in between $200,000 and $300,000 and can be filmed in a much shorter timespan.
Some of these renovation costs are often built into the budget, making it hard for producers to keep costs down.
Falling ratings have also hit HGTV, which remains a top 12 network, per Nielsen, over the last few years. The network is down almost half its total audience in the last eight years; in 2017, it averaged around 1.5M viewers and last year this number was 773,000. Perhaps more importantly, it also heavily losing young viewers; in the 18-49 demo it was down 26% last year, averaging only 101,000 viewers in this age bracket, down from an average of 425,000 in 2017.
In 2015, the network was the 15th most watched network behind History, Discovery Channel, TNT, USA Network and TBS as well as the broadcast networks and sports and news channels such as Fox News and ESPN. By 2019, it had overtaken all of these including USA Network to make it the top cable network with originals outside of news and sport, remaining that way until 2023. However, last year, it fell behind TNT (which arguably could be called a sports network these days) and Hallmark Channel.
It has also struggled in streaming; HGTV shows rarely trouble the HBO Max charts.
“The viewers have just left the building and they’re not coming back,” added another source.
One producer who recently had a show canceled admitted that their show’s ratings were lower than they’d ever been. “I don’t know if it’s a show thing as much of an audience thing where a lot of people are dropping cable. There was a time when people would just put on HGTV when they were cleaning,” they added.
But there have been some bright spots for the network; in February, it said that The Flip Off, starring former Flip or Flop stars, delivered its highest-rated number for a freshman series premiere among adults 25-54 since September 2022. The show is expected to return for a second season but HGTV hasn’t officially announced it.
The rise of DIY TikTok as well as popular Instagram feeds and the preponderance of “Pinterest girlies” hasn’t helped either, with younger audiences drawn more to these platforms to get inspiration rather than turn on a linear network.
In 2023, the network tried to reflect these changes with Home in a Heartbeat, hosted by Galey Alix, a former Wall Street executive turned DIY expert and viral social media star. The series, which saw Alix create dream home renovations in just three days, averaged around half a million viewers for its eight-part run. However, some of Alix’s own TikToks have hit over 27M views.
There is other competition as well; Netflix dipped its toes into the genre a few years ago with shows such as Get Organized with The Home Edit, fronted by Clea Shearer and Joanna Teplin and produced by Reese Witherspoon’s Hello Sunshine, Motel Makeover, Instant Dream Home and Dream Home Makeover, although the streamer is largely out of this housing sector now.
Jessica Alba also got into the renovation game for Roku. Her MGM-produced Honest Renovations series, which she hosts with Lizzy Mathis, is heading into its third season next month.
Chip and Joanna Gaines
Nathan Congleton/NBCUniversal via Getty Images
But perhaps even more significantly, the network has faced competition from stars it helped to launch. Chip and Joanna Gaines, who became famous thanks to HGTV’s Fixer Upper, relaunched the DIY Network, originally a spinoff channel to HGTV, in 2022 as the Magnolia Network in partnership with WBD.
The network included Fixer Upper spinoff Fixer Upper: Welcome Home, starring the pair as well as shows like Maine Cabin Masters, Barnyard Builders and the somewhat controversial Back To The Frontier and reality competition titles such as Roller Jam, Second Change Stage and Human vs. Hamster. Joanna Gaines also recently got back to her renovation roots with Mini Reni, which launched in May.
While the linear network hasn’t pulled up any trees in the ratings, it’s likely to have taken some viewers away from HGTV.
Magnolia, run by President Allison Page, falls under the purview of HBO boss Casey Bloys, whose side of the business will fall under Warner Bros., run by David Zaslav, whereas HGTV falls under the U.S. Networks group, which will be part of a standalone company run by Gunnar Wiedenfels, known as Discovery Global.
Other corporate changes are also impacting the network. Kathleen Finch, who was Chairman and CEO of WBD’s U.S. Networks, retired at the end of last year. She had been with Scripps Networks, which owned HGTV and Food Network, since 1999, before Discovery acquired it in 2018 and at one point was President of HGTV. Sources have noted that her departure has opened the door to further changes.
On the programming side, this meant Howard Lee became Chief Creative Officer at U.S. Networks earlier this year.
Deadline understands that Lee, the former TLC boss behind smash hit franchise 90 Day Fiancé, has been keen to revitalize the network and bring it closer into the zeitgeist. Sources told Deadline that Lee, who also oversees networks including the Discovery Channel, wants more pop culture on the channel in addition to cutting costs.
One show that has highlighted this trend towards more buzzy output is Zillow Gone Wild, based on the popular Instagram feed. The series is hosted by 30 Rock’s Jack McBrayer as he tours some of America’s wackiest and wildest homes that have recently been on the real estate market. Season two of the show, which comes from Asylum Entertainment Group, launched last week.
Zillow Gone Wild (HGTV)
It also greenlit a new show hosted by former Queer Eye star Bobby Berk and exec produced by John Cena. Junk or Jackpot (w/t) is a six-part, Cash In The Attic-style format, produced by 44 Blue Productions, that follows collectors as they discover the true monetary value of their massive and unusual collections.
Talent has been a challenge for HGTV in recent years, according to multiple sources.
One source told Deadline that the network paid a “lot of money” to put their top talent into overall deals, but this hasn’t panned out quite as it had hoped. Yes, there have been some successes such as the Property Brothers, who are behind some of the network’s biggest hits such as Celebrity IOU. But even some of their shows have been recently pushed back; Chasing The West’s premiere was pushed back nearly three weeks to the end of July and the second season of Don’t Hate Your House with the Property Brothers, which was meant to return on July 30, will now air “later this year”. The brothers, Drew and Jonathan, who have made 600 episodes of television for the network, said that this was a scheduling issue related to production dates.
But there have been a number of others that have not panned out. “All of these renegotiations are about how much of a reduction their marquee talent is taking going forward. There’s no way that they’re getting the deals that they once got. They are no longer a talent defining network,” one source told Deadline.
A producer added that they pay talent up to $100,000 an episode on some of these shows.
“They allowed their talent to run amok,” they added. “They gave them some form of creative control and that’s harming their own shows. They were so afraid of talent they never said no and the shows aren’t delivering anymore. They kowtowed to talent and now they’re suffering the consequences.”
Some have encouraged the network to lean into its origins as Home & Garden Television when it launched in 1994. “I think they should covert back to the HGTV of yesteryear where maybe there’s a gardening show or a kitchen show,” said one source.
This was also suggested by one of its former stars Jonathan Knight of New Kids on the Block, who hosted the recently canceled Farmhouse Fixer. “I’ve always urged the people at HGTV to bring the garden aspect back to HGTV,” he told Country Living. “They say the garden shows don’t do well, but I think if there was a really good one, it would do well. People nowadays don’t garden like they used to, but I have a few ideas I’m pitching that will be more farm-based, so we’ll see where that goes.”
Lee is clearly ripping the Band-Aid off the problem and it will be interesting to watch what the next few months hold. “HGTV set the standard so why can’t it reset the standard or at least keep up with what’s going on around you,” concluded one source.
