A mother of three who was drowning in debt had her life changed forever when a millionaire invested £100,000 in her budding restaurant business.
Valerie Mayer, from Portsmouth, balances raising her three children and working as a full-time carer, but as a skilled home cook, she has always dreamed of opening a Zimbabwean restaurant in the UK.
But with a weekly budget of just £53 for her family, pursuing her lifelong passion was put on the back burner as she struggled to make ends meet – and had debt collectors threatening to knock on the door.
She said: ‘My financial situation got so bad that I had bailiffs come in, and I just went into a state of panic. I was looking out of windows to see if anyone was there. I got scared to leave the house.’
Her life changed, however, when she featured on Channel 5’s Rich House Poor House, which airs on Sunday, and traded houses for a week with tech startup millionaire, Steve Bolton, who lives in a swanky £1million, six-bedroom home in Bournemouth.
The father of four left school at 16 with no qualifications but built a business from the ground up and quickly proved his worth, with Steve’s company now having a portfolio worth three quarters of £1 billion.
Given his busy life as an entrepreneur, he missed out on quality time with his children, which is why he invited his eldest daughter, marketing whiz, Ella, and his clothes shop owner son, Charlie, to accompany him on the show.
The family swapped their home with two lounges, a dining room for eight, six bedrooms and five bathrooms, for a week-long stay in Val’s council house 60 miles along the coast.
Val’s three-bedroom semi-detached home backs onto a noisy road, and with a broken washing machine and a drab garden space, it’s seen better days.
While Steve and his two children had to survive on £51.93 for the week, Val and her mother, Cleopatra, got a taste of the high life with a weekly spending allowance of £2,000.
The family in Portsmouth struggled to adjust, but Val and Cleopatra dined on expensive seafood, went clothes shopping, and even enjoyed a day out at the races, making them ‘feel like princesses,’ they said.
However, Val injected a large portion of the money into her passion, putting together a pop-up restaurant for Bournemouth residents to enjoy.
It was a taste of what’s to come for Val – because, unbeknownst to her at the time, when the families reconvened, Steve and his two children had a surprise in store.
After witnessing the care work that Val does, the love she has for her children and community, he not only pledged to invest £100,000 into her restaurant business, but also paid off all her debts and decorated her garden.
Val said: ‘I’m feeling really overwhelmed right now, happy tears, this can really change my family’s life.
‘I really wanted this, and I’m glad that my family is also going to be involved because it’s going to change everything for the best.’
And Steve and his children enjoyed the experience, too, with the father of four saying: ‘The main highlight of this week for me is spending time with my kids.’
Rich House, Poor House airs on Channel 5 on Sunday at 9pm.
