You know what it's like, you go to a property auction with £100k to spend and by the end of the auction you leave without any keys to a building because the lots you loved and wanted to bid on have rocketed to beyond your financial means.
This is an experience that frequently happens to bidders at the very busy property auctions of Wales, but what none have experienced is then being given a property that they haven't even bid on to be transformed into a saleable home by the presenter of a popular TV programme.
Welcome to The Great House Giveaway, the Channel 4 property programme that gives two complete strangers who are not homeowners the chance to secure a rundown home via auction. Once selling fees, buying costs, and the renovation budget has been taken from the eventual sales price the pair split the profit and walk off into the sunset very happy. But that doesn't always happen and getting to that point within a strict timescale can be a painful process.
READ MORE: Homes Under The Hammer's Martin Roberts has bought an old Welsh farmhouse and transformed it
So when it looked like novice renovators Mair and Dafydd were out of property luck with no property to work on, Simon O'Brien stepped into the situation and suggested they come and see a chapel in Neath that didn't sell at the auction. But the pair weren't sure how they felt about it when they turned up at the property and saw the worrying scale of the work to do.
"I've got a bit of news for you", Simon teases the bemused pair, "it's yours!" - so it's too late to back out now because it's been bought by the programme. Simon hands over the front door keys to the speechless first-time renovators who can only blurt out a 'shut up!' and a 'really?...really?!'
Happy days, right? They now at least actually have a property to work. But happy might turn to stressful days as there is a huge mountain of work to climb, from creating rooms to pulling down rooms that have already been built, to moving and updating the kitchen, to the mammoth and costly work to put in a first floor across the beautifully decorated balcony to create a liveable home to put back on the market.
But then they find out that the budget is just £30k and they only have six months to turn it into a home and resell it; there's a stoney silence.
But Dafydd, a 32-year-old lifeguard from Cilfynydd, is the first to break the silence saying: "Chapels are money pits and they are easy to spend on and looking at the place it's hard not to think we're not actually going to finish this project."
Simon is more optimistic, pointing out that the outside of the building is in good order so won't need budget and even the guttering is good - easy for him to say, he's not having to do all of the inside renovation.
But even Simon, an experienced property developer himself, recognises the challenge ahead, quipping as he hands over the keys and makes a run for it: "my prayers are with you!". And they are going to need all the help they can get, spiritual or otherwise, as Siloh chapel is the biggest ever renovation project to appear on the show to date.
Mair, a 40-year-old administrative assistant from Llanelli, voices her initial instinct and it is to feel overwhelmed and looking at the state of the chapel and the massive job of creating a first floor it's an understandable reaction.
The start is slow, with fussing about the sections of the ground floor that don't match and are on different levels, and lots of ripping out including, sadly, the pulpit and some wood wall panelling.
But not much constructive building is happening and the work includes some prickly discussions about clearing up the mess as they go along and not wanting to spend much budget on extra help at this early stage.
Two months in and when Simon visits to see how it's going he is shocked at their lack of progress on creating a ceiling and rooms - the time has been spent on ripping out and organising a yard sale for the items within the chapel and now removed, including a piano.
And he's not very impressed, exclaiming: "It looks worse than on the day they bought it!", but to be fair to Mair and Dafydd they have been trying to secure trades to work on this beast of a building.
The biggest drain on budget, stress and securing trades has been on the construction of the first floor which will require a number of expensive and heavy two-tonne steel beams to be put in place to secure the floor across the balcony, but the challenge was finding any companies available within the time frame that were also willing to take on a sizeable chapel.
Hence the budget spent so far was just a tiny £1,300 and they were having trouble spending it and pushing the project on. Simon has a surprise for them and, based on the last surprise from Simon, aka buying them a chapel without asking them, no wonder they look slightly pensive.
But it's good news thankfully - he has arranged some of his own tradespeople to put up stud walls and create some ground floor rooms if they want to use them, but of course, their fee will have to come out of the pair's renovation budget.
Work moves on creating the first floor, and as Dafydd helps get the huge steel beams into the building, Mair is down at her local Howdens looking for a bargain kitchen and has a rather impressive result - a wall of basic units, worktop, appliances, sink and tap and even an upgrade on the handles for under £1,000.
And just as well because the budget is now on its last legs, with 13 weeks to go until the six-month deadline when the chapel must go back on the market, the budget left is just £8,500 so Mair says they must forget 'luxuries' like doors.
It's not the first, or the last, time a huge and complicated Welsh chapel transformation has appeared on a popular property television programme, Martin Robert's visit to a chapel on BBC TV's Homes Under The Hammer had him falling for the property but flagging up that it was going to be a challenging transformation. Find out more about that here.
That project was being progressed and completed by a professional and experienced development company so the chapel was completed, but poor Mair and Dafydd have never done anything like this before and it's been a baptism of fire for them at the chapel.
Time is up and it's time for the estate agent to visit and value the chapel, but in its current stare it only sits at between £90k - £100k, but with the property finished to a good standard maybe it could be worth between £130k - £150k. The chapel is unfinished and looks very rough around the edges but the pair have run out of time so cannot do any more work on it even if they hadn't also gone over budget.
The chapel was bought for £71,000, the pair spent the £30,000 renovation budget and went over by £4,700 plus £17,400 associated costs so the total spend on the project is £123,100. Not great news.
The chapel goes back into the auction - but it doesn't sell. The exhausted Mair and Dafydd meet up with Simon at the local pub to take stock of the challenging experience, and he's at it again with his rather unnerving surprise announcements.
But this time it really is a fantastic surprise - someone contacted the show and has bought the chapel for £130,000. The new owner of Siloh chapel is going to be a musician from Southampton who was looking for a home that could also accommodate a music studio, and the chapel offered the perfect combination; eventually when it was finished.
Mair and Dafydd both walk away from the property and the programme with almost £3,000 profit in their pockets and well-deserved in Simon's view.
To take on a huge chapel with no experience needs a miracle to complete a transformation on time and on budget; but with a buyer appearing out of the blue it seems Simon's prayer for these renovation novices was answered.
The episode is currently available to view on Channel 4's on demand service All4. And don't miss the best dream homes in Wales, renovation stories and interiors, join the Amazing Welsh Homes newsletter, sent to your inbox twice a week.
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