Landscaping week reaches its muddy, sleep-deprived peak: three working days left, one crane that everybody believes is theirs, and Bunnings dangling $50,000 off a reserve price for whoever has the best garden. Naturally, the day is spent arguing about who gets to lift what, and where.
Key Moments Today
- ARGUMENTHouses Two and Three spar over who actually had the crane, and for how long: “Easy. Adrian, we didn’t have the crane yesterday at all!”
- DRAMAJolene retreats to her car for a breather: “The cogs have absolutely stopped in our backyard.”
- RIDICULOUS PURCHASEA water feature bought for $3,000 is haggled from $1,000 up to $5,000 on a driveway, then onto House One’s block.
- DISASTERA crane lowers the wrong fireplace into the wrong yard: “It is actually the wrong one.”
The Great Crane Dispute
Thursday opens with machinery, rain and a crane parked at House Three. Houses Two and Three have been wheeling materials through a hole in House One’s fence all week, and the crane is the only thing standing between them and a very long day of barrowing mud.
Cue a driveway argument over who had it yesterday, who has it now and how many minutes it was actually on loan (“I had it for 15 minutes on Tuesday night at 5:45”). It ends in a neighbourly truce and a promise to share the soil, which lasts roughly until one voice announces: “I’m going crazy around here.”
“I’m literally going into a hole. I can’t.”
House Three, with the sleepers still to dig in
The Water Feature Shuffle
House One’s problem is the opposite of everyone else’s: Adam and Jolene have $10,000 from the Stan Sport trivia win burning a hole in their pocket, and nothing to spend it on. The water feature Jolene wanted was snapped up by Lisa and Rosco, and every alternative is either in Sydney, in Melbourne or too heavy to arrive in time.
Jolene eventually heads off-site, has what she calls a bit of a meltdown in her car, and is gently talked down by Foreman Dan. Her summary of the week: Adam is “cupcakes and unicorns” while she is chasing a feature that does not exist.
“The cogs have absolutely stopped in our backyard.”
Jolene
Meanwhile, the water feature itself has turned out to be a bigger project than Lisa and Rosco bargained for. It is a sculpture from Raw Edge Rock (a rock sliced up to look like an egg) that needs a pond, a base and a plumber, with quotes of four to five thousand on top of the $3,000 already paid. Rosco decides to quit while ahead and strikes a deal with Adam on the spot.
- Opening offer: $1,000 from Adam, against Rosco’s private bottom line of $7,000.
- The haggle: a rapid-fire volley that lands at $5,800 and $1,800 before Adam rings Jolene.
- Final price: $5,000, a $2,000 profit for House Three.
Jolene, for her part, ends up with olive trees as a compromise (“not a water feature, but a good compromise”), while Lisa’s own olive tree, Martina, is craned in as the centrepiece of House Three’s courtyard.
The Wrong Fireplace
Over at House Two, Chantel and Wyatt watch their fireplace swing through the air like a wrecking ball, only to discover it is not theirs. The black-chimney rectangle they ordered has ended up at House Three, and what has been lowered into House Two’s yard is House Three’s fireplace. Apologies are exchanged all round.
The Cursios, as always, have a plan: clad the borrowed fireplace in the same PGH stone as the house and hope the judges appreciate it. Chantel and Wyatt are, at least, one pizza oven up: a pizza party later in the week produces what the crowd calls a ten out of ten, cooked in 90 seconds.
Garage Sale, Cook-Off and a Cloud Tree
House Four is staring down a $20,000 gap between the $45,000 Troy wants for the front yard and the $25,000 in the bank. Courtney and Sev’s answer is a garage sale and a thank-you lunch for the trades, which doubles as a sales floor. A TV goes for $1,250, armchairs follow, and the total creeps past $2,000.
House Five, meanwhile, is quietly winning the entrance. Rick and Tayla unveil a 30-year-old buxus cloud tree trucked overnight from Adelaide, plus a bespoke water feature from Modern Concrete Co. Rick floats the idea of hiring some fish for the pond; G-Mac says no, and the fish go home with a tradie to “sleep in my bedroom.”
Last Walk-Arounds
Scott and Shelley do their final walk-around of the season, and it is as emotional as you would expect. Rick tears up over Tayla’s design work, Adam insists the wind was in his eyes, and Lisa reflects on finding out she was pregnant in week one. House Two admits they are “crawling over the finish line”, and asked if they would do it again, Wyatt’s answer is a firm “Hell, no!”
“I didn’t cry. The wind was in my eyes.”
Adam
The day ends with thank-yous for caterers Tina and Shayla, and a big win for Lisa and Rosco: their cooking-challenge dish is heading to the shelves as a limited-edition Youfoodz Fuel’d meal, with their faces on the front. “Best day of our lives,” Rosco says.
What’s Next
House One finally cuts off the access path on Saturday, with the judges due in for the last time this season. Houses Two and Three have also run out of wheelbarrow runs, and “I’m over it” is the mood of the street. Sunday is the final reveal, and one house walks away with $50,000 off its reserve.
