The Property Brothers Reveal the Wildest Things to Happen Off Camera

You sit enthralled in front of your TV as Drew and Jonathan Scott transform ramshackle fixer-uppers into welcoming family homes on their hit HGTV shows — but there's a whole lot that goes on during production that you don't see on air. "Weeks and weeks and weeks of stressful renovations are all crammed into 40 minutes," says construction-focused brother Jonathan. We recently had a chance to chat with the Swiffer and Mr. Clean spokesperson to find out what happens behind the scenes during filming. Keep reading to find out the good, the bad, and the ugly below.

While Jonathan insists that 99 percent of the families they work with are incredibly sweet and thankful for all that they do, there are times when they encounter some strange homeowner behavior off air. "We discovered part way through an episode of Property Brothers: Buying and Selling that one of the homeowners was a crazy cat lady," he says of one unforgettable incident. "She came in after we started the reno — and we already didn't have enough time to do everything that we needed to do — and she told me that if her cat walked into the room of the house that we were working on, all work has to stop until the cat decides on its own that it's going to leave." The woman went on to insist that the cat had to leave on its own accord, without encouragement, before they could commence work. Talk about unexpected construction delays!

Drew and Jonathan have spoken in the past about stumbling upon vintage Playboys hidden in a secret bathroom cabinet, but it turns out that's just the beginning of the bizarre things they've found inside the walls of renos. "Twice now, I've found hidden safes that the homeowners didn't know about," says Jonathan, who explains that safes can become concealed after decades of renovations as walls are built and layers of carpets put down. He tells the story of one of the incidents: "The people passed away who owned the house, so their family sold it through probate, and the new owners, who were my clients, when we ripped everything back, found the safe. " Luckily this tale has a happy ending. "We managed to get ahold of the safe company, we got it open, and sure enough inside there was all kinds of jewelry and pictures of when the house was built and things like that. So we managed to find the children of the original owner and we got it all back to them."

"I've found time capsules in the walls before, cute little things. I've planted a lot of time capsules too," says Jonathan, admitting to the secret tradition of planting time capsules in the walls of renos with their clients. "If I've got a family who's really nostalgic like that and they really want to take part in something a little extra, or if there's kids as well and the kids want to do something kind of cool, then I'll make a project," says Jonathan, adding, "I really like to incorporate the kids into our renovations."