Local Couple Competes On HGTV Remodeling Show

On July 20 at 9 p.m. HGTV viewers will get a chance to see what a local couple was able to accomplish while remodeling a condo. This is the first of eight episodes showing the couple through their trials.

Local Coronado resident Amanda Marks and her boyfriend Curtis Goldin of San Diego finished filming Flipping the Block in May. Four couples including Marks and Goldin were chosen to renovate a dilapidated condo in a complex in Glendale for a chance to win $50,000. During each episode, the teams are given a challenge to overcome. Marks and Goldin did most of the work themselves but were allowed to hire subcontractors like electricians and plumbers as needed through the general contractor on the show. Marks and Goldin had very long days while on the show. They worked from six or seven in the morning until midnight.

We tried to do all we could on our own, said Marks. Every team had a budget that could be used to hire subcontractors.

The budget was not large enough to hire everybody. The more you did yourself, the more you could splurge on other things, said Goldin.

Golden worked more than anybody else on the show, said Marks. We were the silver team; all the teams [were identified by] colors. Were the funniest and heaviest team on the block, said Goldin.

HGTV Nicole Curtis host of Rehab Addict and Scott McGillivray host of Income Property were the judges who decided who won the weekly prize which included extra cash for the couples budget. At the end of the show the condos were sold at a live auction and that is how the winning couple is chosen.

The duo remodeled the condo room by room. Until they finished the first room they slept on the floor on air mattresses inside the condo, used the old kitchen and bathroom. Every room we did had a tight timeline. Amanda worked in picking paint and furniture she didnt get as much time as she wouldve liked, said Goldin.

Marks and Goldin have been a couple for one-and-a-half years. They met while he was in the U.S. Navy and she worked as a barista at the Naval Amphibious Base.

Marks is the artistic type who loves to sing, decorate, and sculpt. She says she always dreamed of being a designer while Goldin worked in construction through high school and college. Goldin is currently attending San Diego State University studying engineering and Marks has been visiting family and helping decorate her aunts house.

Marks answered a Craigs list ad that was looking for a dynamic duo with an eye for design. The couple went to a casting call dressed in jeans and plaid shirts. At the casting call at a San Diego hotel there were 40 to 60 people dressed in suits with briefcases and iPads. We have nothing to lose, we said to ourselves and lo and behold we got picked, said Goldin. But not until they went to other interviews including one in New York where they met the executive producer of HGTV, a very exciting moment for Marks who has watched the channel since she was a child.

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Local Couple Competes On HGTV Remodeling Show