I don’t know if you’ve heard, but there are houses across the world filled with influencers. These houses, often referred to as ‘creator houses’ are paid for by investors, in order for influencers to create content for their social media accounts.
Yes, really.
It all began with YouTubers, packed into large mansions who spent all of their time recording themselves, planning content ideas, crazy challenges and ways to gain more views and subscribers.
We have to mention the dreaded Paul brothers, made famous for probably a lot of wrong reasons, who have their well-known Team10 house which has been the cause of many dramatic events, but always, great YouTube content.
Now there are influencer houses popping up for TikTok creators, Instagram creators and the now-not-so-popular Snapchat.
But these influencer houses; how long will they last, what’s the point in them and what benefits are they bringing to the world of social media? Aka, why so much investment?
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Where it all started
It may be believed that the Paul brothers started the first creator house in Los Angeles with Team10 (and they would like you to believe that), but it was actually YouTuber Conor Franta that created the first ever influencer-creator pad.
Franta moved in with other YouTube stars (Kian Lawley, Trevor Moran, Justin Caylen, Ricky Dillon and Sam Pottoroff) to create the new channel called Our 2nd Life in 2012. The group went their separate ways three years later in 2015, but the idea for creator houses, lived on.
However, the Paul Team10 mansion does still exist in Calabasas, LA and was recently raided by the FBI in August 2020. A lot of creators seem to stay for a short while in the house and then release expose-style videos telling of the horrors of living with Jake Paul – not very surprising.
Also not surprisingly, the Team10 house is currently on the recruitment for new roommates/creators.
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How it has evolved
Since the creation of the YouTube fun-houses, other social media apps have come in on the action. TikTok houses have recently been popping up, with one even created in Ireland.
The GOAT House, a $2 million mansion located in South Dublin, Ireland is Ireland’s first ever TikTok creator house. The GOAT House is home to ten of Ireland’s top TikTok stars, boasting 300,000 followers and growing.
One of the most famous TikTok creator houses, Hype House sits in Los Angeles and is home to 19 TikTok stars. TikTok stars like 15-year-old Charli D’Amelio (who recently had a Dunkin Donuts drink named after her and has 106.2 million followers on the app) drop in on the mansion to get their creative juices flowing.
Looking at the #HypeHouse hashtag on TikTok, it has 5.4 billion views showing just how popular this creator house is on the app and the account itself boasts 19.9 million followers.
What’s so good about them?
Firstly, if you want to be a TikTok star, there’s probably no better place to do this than in a TikTok creator house. With all of these individuals having millions of followers on the app, you’re potentially reaching millions of new followers.
With the crossover of audiences, your opportunity to grow on the app is enormous.
As well as having a great location to shoot, the influencers have an army of other influencers to help them shoot and appear in their videos. The constant stream of ideas for content and challenges is abundant and influencers can work on their channels 24/7.
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What’s not so good about them
The influencers joining these creator houses are getting younger and younger. One of the most famous of the Hype House, Charli D’Amelio being only 15 years old.
What happens when these young influencers become very famous very quickly? What happens when in a few years, they are no longer relevant and the next young ‘big thing’ comes along?
Like Vine, TikTok may not be around for a very long time – what will happen to these influencers then? We need only to look at the breakdowns of young stars such as Amanda Bynes and Justin Bieber to imagine what these young stars could go through in the future.
Can you also imagine what it must be like to live with twenty other social media stars who are constantly striving to gain a larger following? How must it feel to be the one with the least amount of followers and views? Are they all secretly in competition with each other?
Mostly, I fear for the mental health of these young social media stars and how this fame will effect them in years to come.
Another issue with influencer creator houses is the never-ending content creation. There will always be someone with their phone in your face, recording your every move. There would be no escaping having your life constantly added to the internet.
Then there is the financial issues that can come with all of these influencers living together. Jake Paul (yes, we have to mention him again) takes a cut from all of his lodgers who post their lives to the internet. The Team10 group also sells a lot of merchandise to fans with others in the house only getting a very small percentage of the profits.
Once the brand deals start coming in, the sponsorships and brand partnerships, tensions could start to rise within the house and financial implications may not have been thought through before everyone moved in together.
Are they here to stay?
Recently, even politicians are a big fan of the concept. Andrew Yang, who is running for mayor of New York City, wants to push for creator houses to appear in the city, bringing in fresh content and setting New York up as a place where content can be created for social media – not just TV.
With the ever-growing popularity of TikTok, it appears these creator houses are only increasing in number. Rihanna has even opened her own Fenty Beauty house for influencers to create social media content for her makeup brand.
As long as social media sticks around and as long as these houses and content creators attract millions and even billions of views, these houses will be sticking around for a while and only multiplying.
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