Mike Holmes Talks HGTV's Battle On The Beach And His TV Career

I did want to talk to you about your career in general, because you were doing construction even before you were ever on television. You were kind of accidentally "discovered" in a sense. What is it that convinced you to want to go into television, and were you hesitant at all to enter the industry at first?

Holy cow — was I ever. Not too many people know this, but I got to know someone big at HGTV only because they wanted me to build them a custom home, and that was many years ago. I'll never forget. The plans were drawn up. It was a very unique home. It was a straw bale home, just so you know, so I studied straw bale, looked at them, and thought, "Okay, you want a Fred Flintstone house? Okay."

Now, I go into his office, and we started going over, "We're going to need to thermal break this. We're going to need to do this." So I'm telling him what he needs to look at, because that's my part. Then when he told me — it was the funniest thing — he says, "No, I know what I'm doing. I want this. I want that." Well, that just put me on — it got on my wrong side. And I said, "You know what? This reminds me of the shows on your channel. Very bad information. I can't believe that you guys are airing crap shows like that. I've seen so many mistakes. I can tell when no permits are pulled." And trust me, I went on for about 30 minutes straight. I had diarrhea of the mouth. I was looking at him, and he's looking at me really strange.

So when I realized that, you know, he was probably tired of hearing me, I said, "I'm sorry. I think I should leave now." And I went to leave his office, and he jumped up out of his chair, and he said, "I want a pilot right away!" And I laughed my head off. I said, "I'm a contractor. I'm not a TV guy. Maybe I can help you behind-the-scenes to make sure that you make it right."

And he bugged me for three months, and in that three months, he kept saying, "I need you to. It's got to be you. It's got to be you." And at the end of it, he said to me — this was his words, "I noticed you like to help one family at a time." And I said, "That's what this is all about." He says, "How would you like to help them all at once?" And I said, "You S.O.B. I own the show, or I'm not doing it." That was the beginning of "Holmes on Homes."

Oh, my gosh. What a story!

Nobody else has heard that, so you've got it hot off the press.