The woman who renovated 50 homes

Diane Foreman is best-known for the creation of several multimillion-dollar businesses.

But she is also a passionate renovator, buying and restoring some 50 homes in New Zealand, Australia and London.

While Foreman’s best known for Emerald Foods, and its icecream brands NZ Natural, Movenpick and Killinchy Gold, it’s property she loves best.

“I get more pleasure seeing a finished house than sending a container of icecream to China,” she told OneRoof.

“It’s part of my soul. I don’t do a lot of new builds, I like to take something that nobody else can see and turn it into something beautiful.

“I love houses, I’m passionate about them, but I hate that term flipping. I’m not trying to do it cheap. I’m always doing more, not less.”

Foreman, who is married to broadcaster Paul Henry, says houses “call to me”.

“I can look at 20 and not feel anything, then the 21st will be it. I can take something ugly and make it beautiful,” she says.

Renovations have to make financial sense, though, and she has an exact recall of the one project in her renovating career that has lost money (a development in Port Douglas, Australia).

Sometimes she’s had four house projects on the go at one time, but right now she’s sitting out the market until better opportunities present themselves.

“I don’t think this is a good market because a) everyone is doing it and b) when the market is red hot, you’re paying a huge amount and there’s no space for the tiny margin you make.

“I can pick it up and put it down. It’s not like you’re responsible for the lives of 100 people in a factory that you have to keep running.”

That said, she taps into a “black book of dreams” of skilled tradespeople, along with her interior designer James Doole and Australian architect Harvey Little, both friends.

“James is absolutely amazing, we bounce things off each other and he project-manages everything. He’s more modern than me, he’s young and funky. We’ll have really good arguments about what shade of white to use. Harvey and I have been close friends for 30 years, we’ve done projects all over Auckland.

“I’m really blessed to work with very close friends.”

Foreman runs the renovations as a business, employing staff and paying tax, and gets annoyed when people do the maths and come up with phenomenal paper profits.

“There are huge inputs, you can’t say that I made X on the house just comparing buying and selling price. These are not my own homes. Each one needs something different, some character or architectural feature I can pick up on.

“I’m not a developer or a speculator, I’m not churning 20 houses in South Auckland.”

It’s not all impeccable light fixtures and craftsman plasterwork, Foreman also applies marketing nous. Raising a busy family of four children means she thinks through how to target each property to the eventual family buyer, figuring if she falls in love with a house, so will they.

She and Doole finish the houses down to the last accessory and Foreman estimates nine out of 10 buyers include the lot in their house purchase.

And, like nearly every builder, she’s unimpressed with the slow handling of resource and building consents by Auckland Council.

Sometimes she’ll fall for her own bait, with her current house a labour of love for four years and not on the market. She shares it with Henry, for whom she fitted a custom wine room as a surprise gift (Henry has put out three wines under the Invivo brand).

“This is the best one I’ve ever done, I’ve still got builders here now. We got married here during lockdown. Between us, we’ve got seven children, and grandchildren. We all think of it as home, with Christmas on the deck.”

In the break between the business of renovations, Foreman is working on house projects with two of her grown kids.

The couple sold their house in Omaha ¯ late last year to spend more time on Henry’s boat. The Moroccan-style house by designer Trelise Cooper and her husband, Jack, got the Foreman and Doole makeover. The new owners bought everything, right down to the teaspoons and bed linen (“We just walked out. I did change the sheets first,” she laughs).

Henry owns a house in Palm Springs, but Foreman is fonder of her flat in London’s Chelsea, to which she gave another makeover during lockdown last year, although she’s not sure when she’ll see it again.

“The tradespeople there are wonderful, you can get anything. But I’m amazed at the depth of talent here too, there’s so much inspiration.”

She has been known to carry designer wallpapers and brass door furniture home in her luggage and has a soft spot for the London classic look.

Sometimes a finished house isn’t even on the market before it sells.

“The three biggest houses I’ve sold, the [buyers] came to me. If you do a good job with passion and enthusiasm, someone just walks up the drive.”

While she’s worked with all the top agents in town, Foreman says she’s been surprised how few agents have contacted her.

“In a market like this, they don’t need me. I’m always looking, but they show me the one and I never see them again. It’s so easy to find a vendor now, and it’s all auction. But if I could find the one, I’d do it again.”

While Foreman started her house passion as an 18-year-old, paying $3000 for land and $15,000 for a group builder Neil house in the North Shore suburb of Sunnynook, she says many women simply don’t have access to the capital to do what she has done.

“I’m actually writing a book, a handy guide for women on houses, relationships and women’s issues.

“I’m someone who loves beautiful properties, whereas the men, my contemporaries on boards, are into tennis or golf or boating.

“I’m lucky in that I’ve been able to keep up my passion. Of all the businesses I’ve done, this is the one in my heart.”

I can look at 20 [houses] and not feel anything, then the 21st will be it. I can take something ugly and make it beautiful.