Crews rush to meet 'Extreme Makeover' deadline in South Jordan

SOUTH JORDAN — On Wednesday, Jessica Gomez and her children, Jonah and Ellie, will be presented with a new home in Daybreak, courtesy of "Extreme Makeover: Home Edition."

The project officially began last Thursday with a crew of thousands of builders and volunteers working around the clock to complete the home by the Wednesday deadline, a mere six days later.

On Monday, Ty McCutcheon, vice president of community development for Rio Tinto — Daybreak's parent company — said the home is coming together nicely and on schedule.

"It looks great," he said. "The roof is on; the exterior is mostly complete."

The project is made possible by donated materials, land and labor as well as the efforts of more than 1,300 community volunteers.

"The volunteers are such an essential element of all of this," McCutcheon said. "It wouldn't be possible without them."

With the project nearing completion, it begs the question: How much would it cost the average person to build a home in six days, without the help of Ty Pennington and the "Extreme Makeover" team?

Maybe not as much as you'd think.

While the various labor organizations would certainly charge a premium for the express package, material costs would stay the same. One industry professional estimated the premiums on a six-day job could run between $100,000 and $200,000 in extra costs, a number that Patrick Holmes of Holmes Homes, the builder of the Daybreak project, seemed to agree with.

"It's hundreds of thousands of dollars," Holmes said of the added labor.

Holmes estimated the house's value at $550,000. He couldn't release the square footage of the home but said it is a standard-sized home for Daybreak on a quarter-acre lot.

Based on those estimates, and assuming you could find a willing crew, a regular Joe could have his own medium-size home on a quarter-acre in Daybreak, ready in six days for between $700,000 and $800,000. There are a lot of variables, and it's hard to pinpoint an exact cost because a six-day project is not something most contractors are eager to deal with.

Justin Taylor, vice president of construction for Rainey Homes, said that if a company were to take on a project of that nature, the first concern would be preserving the quality of the product without cutting corners.