Dovetail maven Elizabeth Finkelstein tells us how her life in and love of beautiful historic homes led her and husband Ethan to start Cheap Old Houses. Began as an Instagram profile showcasing affordable older homes for sale, they've grown the movement into an online community of over 2 million people around the world, featured in their Cheap Old Houses book and on HGTV's show, Who's Afraid Of A Cheap Old House?
How did you start working on Cheap Old Houses, and come to love cheap old houses? Was it a childhood thing?
By the time I was born, my parents had purchased the cheap old house I was raised in, so I was raised in a construction project. When the real estate agent took my parents to see the house, they were the first people he had taken to the house that would get out of the car. 30 years later, when they sold that house, it was beautiful. It was a very grand Greek revival house, and it shaped so much of my identity when I was younger– both in the magic of growing up in an old house with nooks and crannies, but also watching my parents love that house and watching their marriage thrive through their shared identity of working on the house together.
I went on to get a master's degree in historic preservation. My husband, Ethan, comes from a digital marketing background. We put our heads together and started really showing off old houses online, because I felt like my generation was not being spoken to about the beauty and value of old houses. And I really wanted to get the word out on platforms that my generation was using to communicate.
What's the typical process to get a cheap old house in good shape?
We show houses on Cheap Old Houses that are cheap for a whole host of reasons. Some of them are extreme fixer-uppers that need a ton of work and are going to take a very special buyer. Then we show some cheap old houses that are in places that command a lower property value– the cost of living is less and real estate values just aren't that high. Those houses are probably more move-in ready than the sort of neediest fixer uppers. There really isn't an across-the-board answer, but from day one, you just have to make sure that the house is sealed away from water.
Water is going to be the biggest challenge to any old house that can affect the foundation, so you want to make sure that the foundation is secure and that the roof is tight. All the fun stuff that we talk about on Cheap Old Houses, like the pocket doors and the wavy glass– that's all really fun, like we sell t-shirts that say those things on them. The character keeps people excited and motivated, and it's so important to preserve that. But really, when you're approaching an old house, the primary concerns are that it's structurally sound and that there aren't any insidious water problems.
So going to school for historic preservation– was that somewhere you learned trade skills, or did you kind of learn the handiwork while your parents were fixing up your childhood home?
I've always been kind of a creative person and a tinkerer. I don't necessarily believe that if you're going to fix up an old house, you necessarily need to be a DIYer…. Some people DIY everything to save money, some people DIY everything because they're good at it or they love it. But a lot of people hire out the work, which is a perfectly valid thing to do. You either need money or you need time and skills.
My master's degree in historic preservation was very much from a policy perspective and catered to what I did when I worked in New York City in historic preservation, which was to advocate for new landmark designations, and advise the owners of historical buildings on alterations that were historically accurate and appropriate.
Starting Cheap Old Houses at a time when people are feeling very much sort of stuck, not able to create and use their hands, and get that tactile feeling anymore, it wasn’t a surprise that this movement kind of took off. There’s escapism in moving to an old house kind of far away that you can afford, but there's another kind of escapism: escaping the monotony of looking at a screen all day, and actually being able to nurture something with your hands.
In that area, Ethan and I are self-taught. I very often equate old houses to parenting in many different ways, because you cannot know how to raise a child until you've had one– no matter how much everybody tells you. You cannot know the nuances of working on an old house until you just get in there and open things up and start working on it.
I remember when Ethan and I first decided we were going to switch out a light on our own. We couldn't find an electrician that wasn't going to charge us $500 just to visit our house and give us a quote. I had a pair of sconces and I just wanted them in. We went online and Googled how to do it. We put the sconce up and I was like, oh my gosh, we just did that. It was a very little thing, but it was very, very empowering.
Everything that you do in an old house is just a series of steps. A lot of it is doable– not everything has to be DIY, but there are rewards in the small things that you do.
Tell us about your dirtiest Cheap Old House.
We are restoring a late 1700s farmhouse that we got for $70,000. The colonies of bats in the attic that are pooping nonstop into the original plaster walls makes me crazy. It's one of those situations where unfortunately, I think we're going to have to lose some of the plaster upstairs that I've been fighting so hard to save.
But at the end of the day– and old houses are always like this– you're always weighing what you can preserve versus what you can't. If every time it gets hot and humid in the summertime and this plaster is just caked with stuff, it's gonna smell and all this hard work is gonna be for naught.
What are the top five things that are always in your pockets?
Measuring tape always, a pencil, a flashlight, and this is so silly… Wallpaper and paint samples are constantly in my pocket because I'm always looking at how things will look in different lights.
It keeps me excited about the more urgent tasks at hand. If I'm doing the dirty work, looking up and seeing a wallpaper sample, what it's going to ultimately look like, keeps you excited and motivated. And then my phone, because we're always documenting the process and sharing to guide others through what we do… It's just exciting and encouraging to share it with the community and allow people to learn from our experience, and ask questions as we go.
Tell us something surprising about you.
I have often thought about going back to school to be a therapist… I love the psychology of why people fall in love with houses and the sort of more authentic version of their life they envision in that house: what they're running from, what they're escaping, what they think they're going to get from this in terms of personal fulfillment. I've become very interested in that whole sort of dream of what people see when they look at these homes.
How would you encourage other women to take on their own cheap old house?
Lean into it and just start making it happen. There's no one way to do it.
You might need to get creative with financing, you're gonna learn a lot of things that you never knew you could do. Most normal people are going to tell you not to do it. And you should just do it anyway.
It's like any goal. If you're completely out of shape, but you decide that you're going to run a marathon, you can get there. You have to train and you have to figure it out. And you will get there.
I know people who have bought cheap old houses, and then completely changed their career to become slate roofers, or interior designers that specialize specifically in historical homes, or started architectural salvage companies. It really does become very much a lifestyle, and people feel a very strong sense of identity when they do it.
It's interesting because so many of the old house influencers and DIYers I see out there are women… It's very refreshing to be in a space where women aren't sitting in a traditional female role or place that women have been stuck in for so many decades. They’re empowered to just work on their house themselves.
So my advice is just listen to your gut. Don't be afraid to take a leap of faith and fall in love with the house and let that guide you. I just feel I know that probably sounds very cliche, but it's cliche because it's true.
How does it feel to wear workwear made by, for and with women?
I've always been interested in fashion and style as a form of expression. I've always loved interesting colors. And I've always been interested in the way I dress. And it makes me feel good to put on something that I feel looks good on me and represents me.
Dovetail overalls are from a base level really cute, which is really helpful. You don't feel frumpy, like, “oh, I gotta put on something that's utilitarian but isn't making me feel good.”
They’re really functional…. They can hold everything you need. And really, really comfortable. I love the overalls specifically. I feel like they fit me really well.
What are some exciting things people can check out?
I'm wearing Dovetail a ton in our television show, Who's Afraid Of A Cheap Old House? You can stream that on Discovery Plus and Max. We also have a book, Cheap Old Houses, that's my favorite project that I've ever done. It showcases people who have purchased and restored cheap old houses. And what I love is none of the work was hired out to interior designers. This is all just houses that these homeowners did themselves. So they're all really getting their hands dirty with them.
Check out Elizabeth and husband Ethan's progress on their 1700s farmhouse here.
