Ray William Johnson: True Story Podcast - This Dumb TikToker Destroyer a Free House - The Demi Skipper Story

Episode Date: September 4, 2025

Demi Skipper, a TikTok creator behind “The Trade Me Project,” gained fame by bartering up a single bobby pin into a house via a series of increasingly valuable trades. In a generous move, she gave the house to an emerging creator named Shay, but the seemingly heartwarming gesture took a dark turn after Shay allegedly trashed the place, didn’t finalize the deed transfer, neglected maintenance and taxes, and effectively abandoned it

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She's going to start a TikTok challenge where she plans to trade a worthless bobby pin, and she's going to keep trading up and up until she finally gets a house. And Demi's not famous or anything. She has zero followers when this starts, but she is determined to make this work. And so she starts a TikTok account, and she announces her challenge. I'm looking to do something a little crazy for my friends on TikTok.

And people start hitting her up, like, I want to trade, I want to trade. And she trades the bobby pin for some cheap earrings, and she trades the earrings for a set of margarita glasses, and she keeps trading up and trading up and trading up, and people on TikTok love it. Each trade seems to rack up more and more valuable items and more followers for Demi because people want to see if she can actually get a house.

Now eventually, after quite a few trades, Demi trades all the way up to a car. I traded the iPhone 11 Pro Max and got the keys to a 2008 Dodge Grand Caravan. Got it! And so a year passes. And we're now in 2021. And all this has gotten her around four and a half minutes. million followers now. Because people are watching, they're deeply invested, they're hitting her up, giving her advice, they're letting her know if they think she's making the wrong trade. And sometimes

she'll go quite a while without finding anyone to trade with. But she's not going to give up. She keeps going. This project really does mean the world to me. And even when it's tough, I'm going to keep pushing through. And at this point, she's traded up to a Chipotle card that gives her a year supply of Chipotle, and she trades that for a trailer worth $40,000. And that trailer leads to Demi's biggest trade. See, a house flipper in Tennessee has been following her videos this whole time, and she offers to trade Demi for one of her properties. And so after all that work, after over a year, Demi has finally done it. She successfully traded a bobby pin up to a house in Tennessee. Oh, but that's not all. Because she's a decent person,

she decides she's going to give away the house to someone in need. What you have to do to enter is one, make a video that starts with I want the Trade Me Project House and tell me why. And like immediately, over 2,000 people submit an application to her, telling her why they need this house. And it's like, it's like America's got talent. Like they've all got a really sad story to tell. But one of these applicants really stands out. This young woman named Shea. Shea is 18

and she's staying with a friend because she has no home of her own. I guess she's essentially homeless. When I was two years old, I lost my mom. She was in a car accident. And her story is honestly very sad. And she submits it to Demi

and Demi's like, this is it. This is the one. I'm here to tell you that the house is yours. There is no way. So in 2022, Demi gives her the house. And to make it that much cooler, she and her husband spend lots of time and resources renovating the place for Shea because, you know, they want it to be nice for her. And Demi helps Shea and her boyfriend and her boyfriend's mother move into the place. She sets up an Amazon wish list for items that they'll need, which Demi's fans start buying things for Shea and having them delivered to the house. Demi even gives her a $10,000 check to get start

on her new life. How nice is that? So this is perfect for Shea. I mean absolutely nothing. Nothing could go wrong for her. Until. If nothing went wrong, I wouldn't be making this video. So the challenge is over and Demi returns to her normal life back in San Francisco and months go by. And one day Demi gets a message from one of Shea's neighbors in Tennessee saying, hey, a bunch of packages are piling up. outside of that house that you gave Shea. So Dimmy hits up Shea and she asks her about them and Shea's like, oh, I'm back in Pennsylvania for a visit. But Shea says she plans to go back to Tennessee soon. Cool, no harm, no foul. A week later, Demi hits her up again about the packages. She also

asks Shea to take some pictures of the rugs that are in the house because I guess a company donated some rugs to the project and they want to use those pictures as promotional material. And so Shea's like, I'll take the pictures of the rugs tonight as soon as I get home. But she doesn't take the pictures. In fact, she starts kind of dodging Demi. And so Demi reaches out again and again and again, but Shea seems really flaky. And it's she just not even living in the house that she gave her. And this whole time, a neighbor has been collecting all of Shea's packages and storing them,

which is mostly all of that stuff that Demi's fans had been donating to Shea, including stuff off that Amazon wish list. So after a couple of months of that neighbor collecting all these packages off Shea's porch, Demi decides to donate all that stuff to Goodwill. So that if it can't help Shea, at least this stuff will help someone in need. And more months go by. And at this point, it's become very apparent that Shea is not making any real attempt to live in the house. And so Demi messages her and she asks her straight up if she plans on moving in.

And Shea gives her some bullshit excuse about not having a driver's license or something, I don't know. But then, like, 10 more months go by. And it's now 2023. And there's still no sign that Shea is living in the house. And so Demi and her husband drive all the way from San Francisco to Tennessee to check the place out for themselves. Because, you know, they technically still own it. And so they get to Tennessee and they enter the house. And that is when they see that the place is completely trashed.

Not just a little messy, but there's like urine and maggots. And they were apparently just like opening up the closet and just throwing their trash. And just like using the closet as a trash can. And so it seems like Shea won the house, moved in with her boyfriend for a brief period of time back in 2022, destroyed the place until it became a shahole, and then abandoned it. And it's just been stringing Demi along this whole time. So, of course, Demi is devastated. I mean, she spent all that time and effort trying to help someone.

And, like, look at what they did. I'm, like, actually so sad for her. Like, so sad for the house and the journey. And, like, just, like, don't know who to be sadder for. This is so fucking stupid. And Demi messages Shea, and she confronts her and basically tells her that the place, is no longer hers. I guess Demi hadn't actually transferred the deed over to her yet.

And then Shea writes back, apologizing some bullshit excuse like, I'm only 19 years old and I'm confused about being an adult. Yeah, okay. And so Demi takes the house back and Shea doesn't fight her over it, thank goodness. But I guess Shea does get a little butt hurt because then she goes on TikTok and she posts this video of herself looking sad and saying, When I literally want a house from a TikToker, but then later was banned from the property. So then Demi has to make a response, and she gets on TikTok, and she exposes all the text messages and stuff. It's really sad now that it's come to this, but I figured I owed you guys every receipt,

every screenshot, all the things that have happened. And so then, I guess like Shay's embarrassed and she gives up and she makes all her social media accounts private, and she removes all of her content, which is probably for the best. But ultimately, after all that, Demi appears to have fixed the house back up again and she donated it to some housing organization. So, good for her.