TikTok
"I wake up and think: 'Is this actually real? Is this actually my house?'"
TikToker Demi Skipper has successfully traded a bobby pin for a free house in Nashville, Tennessee.
The San Francisco native started the "Trade Me" project back on May 26 in 2020 on social media platforms TikTok and Instagram. Skipper then spent a year and a half with the mission to trade up by swapping items with higher and higher value until she could turn a bobby pin into a home.
Demi has acquired and given away everything from margarita glasses, an Xbox, a snowboard and more. She had even gotten her hands on a Wildbound Tiny Cabin and other items she traded up included a Honda CRV, three tractors and a $40,000 trailer with a Tesla Powerwall 2.
The Tiktoker finally made the final and most impressive trade after Thanksgiving, a home in Nashville where she and her husband are planning on residing for the foreseeable future.
While documenting her journey, Skipper amassed more than five million followers on TikTok who tuned in to watch her trade up from a worthless bobby pin to an entire house completely free of charge.
Her final "Trade Me Project" TikTok video amassed 3.6 million views and fans watched Skipper approach her new house for the first time.
"I can't believe this," she said in her very last swap video after seeing her house for the first time. "A year and a half of trading a single bobby pin until I get a house, and I’ve done it. And look at it, this just shows you — it's possible!"
"People really have doubted me, and I certainly did at times during the journey too," she continued. "But I learned a lot about myself in the process, and I was really amazed by my ability to stick with it."
In an interview with NBC News, Skipper stated, "It's been so surreal. Working towards something every day for more than a year and half, and now I wake up and think: ‘Is this actually real? Is this actually my house?'"
The San Francisco native and her husband plan to make the move to relocate in January to renovate the home and start the process all over again.
"I want to donate the next house I trade to a person who needs it, no mortgage, no rental," she concluded. "There's been a couple of people who have done this once, but no one's crazy enough to do it twice."
