“I'm very harsh on real estate agents. I'm not sure why. Maybe it's because of how the call every small house 'charming' and every run-down house a 'great fixer-upper'. Just once, I'd like them to show me a house and declare, 'This one's a piece of crap'.”

“I was an empty shell. Like a vacant house―condemned―for months I'd been utterly uninhabitable. Now I was a little improved. The front room was in better repair. But that was all―just the one small piece. He deserved better than that―better than a one-room, falling-down fixer-upper. No amount of investment on his part could put me back in working order.”

“A beach house isn't just real estate. It's a state of mind.”

“Never agree to marry a man because he has potential. Men are not houses, they do not make good fixer-uppers.”

“All you have to do is take a man at face value. Don't go into it thinking you can change them. Men aren't fixer-uppers, not like a house or a car. You buy them as is.”

“Every inch of the house is covered in flowers and lace and screams tacky. It's like Martha Stewart vomitted, and this is the crap that came out.”