By Claire Williams
Photos by Specialties Photography
Most people know about Waco’s famous home renovating couple, Chip and Joanna Gaines, who have inspired people all over Texas to take on old, rundown homes and give them a new life. Bryan College Station has a home-flipping couple of its very own — Brian and Lesli Stephen. In the late 90s, the Stephens started their home renovating business, named Brincalcade after three of their children. They are always looking for historic properties in the Brazos Valley to reinvent.
With the help of a few local realtors, the Stephens take old, rundown homes in the B/CS area and give them a new life. One of their most recently completed renovations, located on E. 28th Street, is a home that dates back nearly 100 years. Although public records state the home was built in the 1940s, several features within the home support the idea that it is actually quite older than that, Brian says.
The Stephens want to preserve as much of the history and original pieces within the homes as they can. In this particular home, they were able to salvage a lot of unique features. “There was a built-in glass bookcase in one of the oddly shaped hallways that we reused in the kitchen to be countertop-to-ceiling cabinetry for display,” Lesli says. “We also refurbished some of the original kitchen cabinetry as fun accent pieces in the bathrooms.” The Stephens also enlisted the help of Foster Stained Glass Studio to etch some details into some beautiful, original glass doors in the master bathroom.
To preserve the history of the home, the Stephens reutilized the unique tubs and sinks, which keeps the character of the home alive. They didn’t stop there. They repurposed small details within the home as well, such as hinges and hardware, doors, sconces above the fireplace, and they even preserved the original weight and pulley systems on the windows.
Lesli restored most of these features herself. “I took all of the hardware that went on the doors and cabinetry and found a process to clean them up,” she says. “I put them in a crockpot and cooked them, and took a metal brush and scraped all of the paint off. Every day I would go home with a bucket of more pieces to cook.”
The beautiful wooden floors are also original, in addition to an accent wall of shiplap, a growing trend among homeowners and renovators. Even when they could not salvage an original area of the home, the Stephens thoughtfully picked out pieces that would complement the age of the house. “We tried to use black and white tile that lent itself to that time period,” she says.
Lesli keeps the homes neutral so that future homeowners can still influence how the home looks. “I try to think about what I want in a home,” Lesli says. “I like open and flowing spaces where someone can just walk in and say, ‘This is exactly what I want.’”
The work that flipping houses requires is not for the fainthearted, says Brian. “You’ve got to do your homework,” he says. Every home is full of its own unique challenges and surprises. The city’s permitting process requires everything to be updated because the codes are completely different today than they were back then, which can force you to expand your budget, explains Sherry Perry, the realtor the Stephens worked with on this project. Additionally, having to be available and present all of the time can be taxing. “You have to love to work,” Brian says.
Despite the challenges, Lesli says flipping a home is not as hard as one may think. “A lot of people think refurbishing a home must be done professionally,” she says. “We realized we could do all that. Everything’s so easy to look up nowadays. It’s all at your fingertips with technology.”
Budget plays a significant role in the process. “It’s probably not as profitable as people think,” Perry says. You have to think about budget, not dream home, Lesli adds.
The transformation makes it all worth it. “My favorite part was actually seeing how the old pieces can become new,” says Lesli. “Those were the wow factor.”
After the Stephens finish a home, a realtor stages it to help the buyers imagine themselves living there. During this home’s open house, two families who had lived there previously came by. They reminisced about living in those spaces, and recognized all of the preserved pieces throughout the home, says Perry.
Typically, the Stephens work on two or three houses at a time. Although the property on E. 28th Street is no longer available, they just put another finished home on the market, located at 909 S Coulter Drive. Buyers should continue to look out for flipped homes from the Stephens, Perry says. “They’re always looking to buy houses that they can revitalize and give it a new life.”
