A Signal Hill construction company takes pride in building perfect personal spaces, and its Southern California creations are now in the national spotlight.
MTR Construction’s handmade designs have grown from local referrals to a weekly feature on the Home and Garden Television (HGTV) series “Christina on the Coast.”
Mike Rose, founder of MTR Construction, began his career in construction when he was 18 years old. He worked for a framing contractor during the summer before his senior year of high school.
When he graduated the following year, he returned for full-time work and found his career path.
Rose said he worked for multiple contracting and construction companies, including Suffolk Construction Company in Los Angeles. He helped work on projects such as the Stadium Lofts near Angel Stadium of Anaheim and the Temecula Ridge apartments in Temecula.
“I worked my way from kind of like an apprentice to a superintendent project manager,” Rose said.
Rose said the constant commuting and moving that came with his jobs began to take a toll on him. After moving with his family to Long Beach in 2005, he earned his General Contractor license and left Suffolk in 2007 to begin his own contracting company, MTR Construction.
Rose’s first solo job was to renovate his grandmother’s kitchen in Glendora. He offered to do it for free so he could have a kitchen renovation on his resume.
Rose’s grandmother was so impressed by his work, she advertised his business to her fellow volunteers at the Children’s Hospital of Orange County. These referrals kept Rose busy and kickstarted his career as a contractor, both as his own boss and his only employee.
“I worked like seven days a week,” Rose said. “I think because I was super cheap and I was just doing everything myself, I stayed busy.”
Presently Rose and MTR Construction specialize in designing and building luxury spaces inside homes within Los Angeles and Orange County. While almost all of their work is relegated to homes in Southern California, Rose and his company’s work may be familiar to millions outside of the state, as the general contractor for “Christina on the Coast.”
The series follows Christina Hall, a longtime HGTV personality known for her other show “Flip or Flop,” where she helps Southern California homeowners reimagine their spaces.
Since the first season of “Christina on the Coast,” Rose and MTR Construction have been an integral part of the reimagining process.
“Just making sure that everyone’s on the same page and working towards the same thing and making sure the homeowners are ultimately super happy at the end of it, I think to me is always the big challenge.”
Mike Rose, founder and owner of MTR Construction
Two years before Rose was involved with “Christina on the Coast,” MTR Construction collaborated with HGTV on its series “House Hunters Renovation” in 2016. For the third episode of the 14th season, MTR was brought on to renovate the owner’s loft of the Bay Theatre in Seal Beach.
According to Rose, what was supposed to take two months ended up turning into a year and a half of work. Afterwards, the production company reached out to him and offered possible future work on reality TV. In 2018 he was called on midway through filming of the first season of “Christina on the Coast,” and has been on the show since.
“They asked me, ‘How many houses do you want to do?’ and then it just kind of kept growing from there,” Rose said.
Most of the passion for his work on “Christina on the Coast” comes from Rose’s affinity for design. He said that as opposed to “Flip or Flop” and other HGTV shows, where the purpose is to increase property value, “Christina on the Coast” is focused on making a space perfectly fit the needs of a homeowner and their family.
“It’s a fun process, but nevertheless, it’s still a process,” Rose said. “Just making sure that everyone’s on the same page and working towards the same thing and making sure the homeowners are ultimately super happy at the end of it, I think to me is always the big challenge.”
The setting for the show is another important aspect to Rose, he said. While preparing for new seasons, Rose said he will sometimes try to persuade clients in Long Beach to be featured in the series, which primarily showcases Orange County homes.
Rose said he likes to give back to his communities as a donor to the Long Beach fire and police departments as well as Saint Joseph Catholic School sports and to other local sports programs.
The newest and fourth season of “Christina on the Coast” is currently airing new episodes Thursday nights at 9 p.m. on HGTV and can be streamed on Discovery+.
It’s nice that HGTV uses This construction co , but I think it’s one of many contractors Christina uses because I know she uses Izzy too, because I watch theshow. Christinaprobablyhas 4 or 5 contractorssheuses..