Occasionally good fortune smiles and an opportunity presents itself that turns out to be amazing. Dave Morrow chronicles how lady luck connected him and his new bride with Chip and Joanna Gaines of Magnolia Homes to remodel their house. Dave has repaired and remodelled many old houses, but the design flair of the Mailander House made him believe this one was a real opportunity. His good fortune was to have the creative genius of Joanna Gaines applied to the house he and his new bride would own.
This story recounts how and why Dave and his wife Marla Hendricks found an old house left for dead and brought it back to life. It describes many of the events not shown on the cable television episode, and what it is really like to live in a fixer-upper. At times funny, it is an uplifting story of how vision, persistence and willingness to go where others would not, can bring tremendous satisfaction and success.

David Morrow studies the ethics and political philosophy of climate change and climate policy. He is a Research Fellow with the Institute for Philosophy and Public Policy at George Mason University and Director of Research for the Institute for Carbon Removal Law and Policy at American University. He was previously Assistant Professor of Philosophy at the University of Alabama at Birmingham. He received a Ph.D. in Philosophy from The Graduate Center of The City University of New York and an M.A. in Public Policy from the University of Chicago.