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Alison Victoria is a fixture on HGTV. The Chicago-based designer and home renovation expert stars in Windy City Rehab, which wrapped up its fourth season in June 2023. She also appears in many of the network’s other shows, including Battle on the Beach and Ugliest House in America. Her new show, Windy City Rehab: Alison’s Dream Home premieres July 25 on HGTV.

Victoria might give TV viewers a candid look at her professional life. But when it comes to sharing things about her personal life, she keeps things pretty quiet. However, she’s revealed a few tidbits over the years. 

Alison Victoria said her boyfriend helped her stay positive during a difficult time 

When Windy City Rehab premiered in 2019, Victoria worked closely with contractor Donovan Eckhardt to fix up properties in Chicago. (The pair also starred together on Kitchen Crashers.) But their professional relationship soon soured. Lawsuits from unhappy clients and stop-work orders from the city threatened her business. Victoria, who blamed Eckhardt for the problems, spent a year disentangling herself from her relationship with her former partner. 

“I have friends that have gone through divorces that aren’t this bad. And those divorces were really bad,” she told People in 2020. 

It was a challenging time for Victoria. She told the magazine that she leaned on her family and friends, as well as her boyfriend Michael Marks, for support. 

Previously, Victoria was married to a man named Luke Harding, she shared with HGTV. It’s not clear when that relationship ended.

The ‘Windy City Rehab’ star’s boyfriend bought a property she rehabbed

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Marks has also supported Victoria in other ways. An LLC registered to his name purchased a Lincoln Park townhouse she rehabbed in Windy City Rehab Season 1, according to a December 2021 report from the Chicago Sun-Times. 

When the episode first aired, the sale price was listed as $2.2 million. But an updated version of the episode mentions a $1.567 million sale price. That was the amount Marks’ company paid for the property sometime after the episode was first broadcast. 

The deal was “conducted after the airing of that episode; and … concluded after offering the property for sale to other prospective purchasers,” Marks said in an email to the Sun-Times.  

“I don’t recall the exact details from their show, nor was I privy to other bids the ownership group received, but I do recall they felt it was sold to a different party at the time of airing,” he added. “I wasn’t aware [of] that sale, or any other, [and] didn’t end up closing until much later.”

Victoria spoke about freezing her eggs in a 2022 episode of her HGTV show 

Victoria tends to keep the focus on her professional life on her HGTV shows. But she spoke about her and her partner’s desire to have kids in a 2022 episode of Windy City Rehab. While they weren’t ready to have kids just yet, she did decide to freeze her eggs so that she might be able to become a mother in the future. 

“So years ago I tried to freeze my eggs and it was unsuccessful. I just don’t want any more time to go by; I really want to have an insurance policy that one day, I can have a family, if and when I’m ready,” she explained in the episode.  “I want to have my own children, and I want to have that option and I never want somebody to tell me that I can’t.”

Victoria added that freezing her eggs was “a stressful thing to do,” especially while dealing with “a bunch of stress with jobs and clients and whatnot.”

“But is it ever the right time? Probably not,” she added. “So I’m just taking this and I’m just like, ‘This is my time to do it.’ I just want to set myself up and my partner up for success when it comes to family planning.”

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