No single renovation in television history has made me as angry as Fixer Upper’s “Three Little Pigs” house. Now a man suspected of drunk driving inadvertently fixed Fixer Upper’s work by plowing his car through the TV-famous home’s porch, per the Waco Tribune-Herald. Maybe it’s a sign that the original porch should have been rebuilt with at least some of its orignal character preserved?
Allen Wayne Miller, 31, was arrested after being found inside his Hyundai Accent by Waco police and fire crews around 1:20 a.m. Saturday morning. The Hyundai had plowed through the front of the Fixer Upper-featured home at 1902 Alexander Ave. in north Waco.
The house sits at a T-intersection where 19th Street ends at Alexander Ave. Tire marks in its sloped front lawn indicate that the Hyundai caught air over the brick base of the porch, launched through the porch railing and into the home. Waco Assistant Fire Chief Don Yeager explained the Hyundai’s trajectory as the ultimate “Demo Day” tool to the Waco Tribune-Herald:
The yard is built up several feet, and he hit the embankment of the yard, apparently went airborne, and like a lot of older homes, this house was built up off the ground, so he cleared the rest of the yard. He didn’t hurt the hedges, but he took out the railing on the porch and went right into the window of the front room and hit an interior wall that might be a load-bearing wall.
The alleged drunk driver made it all the way through an office at the front of the house, knocking down the wall that separated the office from the living room before coming to a halt. (The Herald has more photos of the interior damage as well as the boarded-up outside of the home here.)
A brick fireplace that had been relocated to the living room by Fixer Upper was likely the thing that stopped the car from entering the homeowners’ bedroom, notes the Waco Tribune-Herald. Owners Ken and Kelly Downs were sleeping in that bedroom, and were not hurt in the crash.
The driver was treated for minor injuries at a local hospital before being taken to the McLennan County Jail. A search warrant was issued for a blood draw to check Miller’s blood alcohol level. The warrant noted that Miller was aggressive with authorities. He was released from jail Saturday evening.
Now, that porch railing will need to be redone, and not just because it already needed to be redone after Fixer Upper butchered the crap out of it. I’m really honest about this being my most hated house renovation on TV, and that’s as a person who routinely sits through Flip or Flop beige-washing the crap out of poor, unsuspecting California homes that deserve better.
The house that Fixer Upper’s Chip and Joanna Gaines nicknamed “Three Little Pigs” on episode 10 of season 3 is the home equivalent of a classic 1960s Chevrolet Camaro with a mid-nineties Pontiac Trans Am nose slapped on the front. It left me irrationally angry, as the Fixer Upper crew removed most of the unique elements that had actual Craftsman style from its front elevation.
Now would be the perfect time to finally re-fix the out-of-character front of the home—and possibly sell it for a hefty profit, as Fixer Upper homes tend to get. The Downses have been extremely frustrated with their purchase, having complained to authorities for over a year about crime in the neighborhood to little response. Kelly Downs told the Waco Tribune-Herald:
It’s like the Wild West here. There’s been a lot of commotion coming from the bars and the store across the street. It’s been a problem from the beginning. We’ve lived here a year and a half and we feel deceived by the city of Waco and Magnolia Realty.
The couple says this isn’t the first time they’ve had issues with drivers failing to stop at the intersection. They’ve also faced harassment from neighbors who believe that Fixer Upper homes are raising their property taxes. Now the couple is questioning why the show’s Magnolia Realty would have even showed them this home in the first place.
It’s a sad situation, because Waco should have more of its grand old homes saved from the bulldozer in older neighborhoods. Unfortunately, when there’s HGTV superstars doing the re-build, saving a cool old house comes with a lot of baggage.