When Contessa Mendoza was 17 years old and still in high school, she made the tough decision to become a single mom. This exceptional young lady went on to become the valedictorian of her high school graduating class and eventually earned her masters degree. Despite enormous odds, Contessa, who is a social worker, has given everything of herself to raise her daughter and two foster kids. When it was decided that the Van Nuys, California house where Contessa Mendoza and her family live needed more space, the team of designers and workmen of Extreme Makeover: Home Edition stepped in and made some dramatic changes, including adding a second story to the house.
Overview
Extreme Makeover: Home Edition is an American reality television series providing home improvements for less fortunate families and community schools. The show is hosted by carpenter and veteran television personality Ty Pennington.
Each episode features a family that has faced some sort of recent or ongoing hardship such as a natural disaster or a family member with a life-threatening illness, in need of new hope. The show's producers coordinate with a local construction contractor, which then coordinates with various companies in the building trades for a makeover of the family's home. This includes interior, exterior and landscaping, performed in seven days while the family is on vacation and documented in the episode. If the house is beyond repair, they replace it entirely.
Episodes
S01E01 The Powers Family
February 15, 2004 60 min
The Powers had tried to make improvements to their fixer-upper home, but when youngest daughter Olivia was diagnosed with a life-threatening form of leukemia, caring for her became a family affair and took time away...
When Trent Woslum, a sergeant in the California National Guard, was finally able to buy his family their first fixer-upper home as a Christmas present in 2002, little did he know that by Valentine's Day...
For years John Cox traveled worldwide to help churches and organizations. Meanwhile, to support her dedicated husband's endeavors, his wife, Wendy, quit her job as a nurse to stay at home and care for their...
When Contessa Mendoza was 17 years old and still in high school, she made the tough decision to become a single mom. This exceptional young lady went on to become the valedictorian of her high...
The McCrory Family is very large. They were living in a very small house. With two sons already, they found out the were going to get triplets. Can EM:HE give them a bigger home for...
""Sweet Alice"" Harris is known for her kindness and watchful eye on the neighborhood. Her house went through some floods though and desperately needed a makeover. But, with the show title being Extreme Makeover: Home...
Robert Gil's life and his family's was changed forever when he was involved in a car accident and left paralyzed form the neck down. They had a two-story house and Robert had no way to...
Several years ago, when Freedman Hardin II lost track of his father, he decided to go looking for him. As luck would have it, he found him on Father's Day four years ago. Freedman II...
An SUV crashes into a house. No one was hurt. John Tugwell, a former Vietnam veteran who presently works for the U.S. Postal Service, and his wife, Susan -- a fourth grade school teacher and...
The Extreme Makeover Home Edition team provides the right medicine for a young man whose house was making him sick. It wasn't easy for Carrie Powell to bring relief to her younger son, Keenan, who...
Two parents pass away leaving eight kids behind ages 12-23. They have to share a single bathroom. The older ones are left to take care of the younger ones. This is in Livermore, California. In...
Just months after a young, divorced mother of two got involved with a blood drive, she received a call that her marrow matched that of a baby girl with leukemia. At the time, Brook Imbriani...