Unexpected Visit from HGTV Stars Brightens Grand Opening Week for Hope House

Ahouse that was best known as a funeral parlor in an iconic 90s movie is officially starting its journey as a home where prolific life transformation takes place—and modern day TV stars paid an unexpected visit to the charmingly remodeled home this week.

Friday marks the grand opening of Hope House, a 501(c)3 maternity home located at 555 E. Stanford St. in Bartow, the location of the 1991 film “My Girl.”

On Wednesday, while Hope House Executive Director Tara Johnson was leading a tour of the facility with members of the Bartow Fire Department, a volunteer informed Johnson she might like to meet a couple of “My Girl” fans who were checking out the exterior of the home.

Those fans just happened to be HGTV power couple Ben and Erin Napier, the stars of “Home Town,” a show dedicated to the restoration and rejuvenation of historic homes in a small Mississippi town.

“I heard someone say there were some people from ‘home town’ out front, and I just thought they meant that some locals who grew up in Bartow were there. But one of the firemen recognized what the volunteer was saying and was like, ‘You mean the people from HGTV?’” Johnson recalls.

The Napiers are in the midst of a series of home renovation projects in Sebring, Florida for the upcoming season of “Home Town Takeover,” and after watching the movie last weekend the couple decided to come see what the “My Girl” house looked like 30+ years after the movie was released.

Erin posed for photos on the front porch and on the stunning staircase just inside the front door. Then the couple conversed with Johnson, who shared with them the purpose of Hope House, which is to operate as a maternity home that exists to serve, equip and empower first-time, expectant moms who have chosen life for their babies.  

Erin was so deeply impacted by the visit that she shared about Hope House with her more than 1.5 million Instagram followers on Wednesday, eliciting more than 100,000 likes and thousands of comments, as well as a number of donations through the Hope House website.

“We pulled up to find it under renovation, and I took a photo on the steps where Vada sat, when a woman walked out on the porch and invited us to see the inside,” Napier wrote on Instagram. “I felt teary hearing their stories of the money raised by donations and work done exclusively by volunteers to give these women in need a refuge. They will be giving these women life skills with courses in infant care, parenting, mental healthcare, job placement, and Bible classes. They wanted the house to be beautiful so these new mothers see how worthy they are of beauty, and that they can expect this for their lives, no matter how desperate they may feel now.”

“They wanted the house to be beautiful so these new mothers see how worthy they are of beauty, and that they can expect this for their lives, no matter how desperate they may feel now.”“

– HGTV Star Erin Napier via Instagram

In one short visit, her experience and emotions encapsulates so much of the purpose and mission of the home. Friday is a banner day for Hope House, with Bartow Chamber of Commerce hosting a ribbon cutting at the home at 9:30 a.m., with a special VIP benefit later that morning and an open house for the general public from 4 to 6 p.m.

“It is truly the culmination of so much dedication and commitment from incredible volunteers, business partners and donors for the purpose of helping pregnant women in crisis know ‘Yes you can,’ and ‘You’ve got this,’ even though the odds are stacked against them,” Johnson said. “We are going to change the narrative. We are going to be the rich soil that surrounds these women, these babies.”

The narrative she speaks of includes the fact that the United Way and Give Well Community Foundation identified in a 2023 study that Polk County residents “believe there are difficulties with accessing care and the quality of care” when it comes to healthcare. There were more than 2,100 induced terminations of pregnancy in Polk County in 2023, and women in Polk who are scared, involved in unhealthy relationships and/or lack a community of support have had nowhere like Hope House to turn to give birth to their child and become the mother their child needs them to be.

“Every week for months I have been getting calls—even before we had an official number listed on our website—from young women who are pregnant and have nowhere to go, or who are sleeping on someone’s couch trying to figure out what their options are,” Johnson said. “And I’ve had to try to refer them out of county or share other resources with them, but finally we can offer them hope in the form of a home and community that is fully committed to them succeeding and becoming self-sufficient women and mothers. In a sense we are foster care prevention, and we are also stopping what could become an adverse cycle for women who are in tumultuous relationships and could incur additional crisis pregnancies without this kind of support.”

“It is truly the culmination of so much dedication and commitment from incredible volunteers, business partners and donors for the purpose of helping pregnant women in crisis know ‘Yes you can,’ and ‘You’ve got this,’ even though the odds are stacked against them.“

– Tara Johnson, Hope House Executive Director

Hope House is partnering with local pregnancy care centers including Options for Women and a Woman’s Choice and other local nonprofits including One More Child and Lighthouse Ministries to create a pipeline for referrals as well as an experienced and compassionate network of organizations to work toward the best for Hope House residents before, during and after their time in the home. Hope House will begin accepting applications later this month.

The home features six bedrooms with en suite bathrooms to accommodate six pregnant mothers, and eventually their children, as well as a room for professional therapy sessions, a separate office space for Johnson and her staff, and much more. Resident Director Debbie Kelly will oversee programming and day-to-day operations for women, and she will live on site in a brand new unit that is being built as a gift to the organization by Hulbert Homes. 

There is no religious requirement for women to be residents of the home, yet the renovation of the 7,396 square foot home and the creation of the programming that will be offered has been nothing short of miraculous, something Johnson is quick to credit to God and Christians throughout the community.

“We are collectively taking our impact, influence, and resources and laying it on the table for the Lord and seeing what he is going to do,” Johnson said. “He has done incredible things to get us to this point, and we believe this is only the beginning for Hope House. With the extraordinary need there is for programs and homes like this, we pray this is the first of many homes.”

Officials at Rooms to Go were so inspired by the vision of Hope House that it donated brand new furniture and accessories for the majority of the home.

Hope House currently relies primarily on donations from individuals, churches and partner organizations, and it will work diligently to apply for grant opportunities that are oftentimes dependent on data from the lived experiences of clients.

Hope House is in need of monthly recurring givers who will be the backbone of support to serve as many women and children as possible and corporate, small business and church partners who make the cause part of their mission.

To learn more about Hope House or to make a gift online, visit hopehousefl.org.