TikTok’s collab houses

The drama between two Tik Tok houses

Photo+courtesy+of+Flickr+via+Creative+Commons

Photo courtesy of Flickr via Creative Commons

Tik Tok is an app that was founded in 2012 and launched in 2017 by a Beijing based company called ByteDance. Many people downloaded the app and started making videos, but certain people became “Tik Tok famous”, acquiring many followers and likes on their videos. Tal Fishman and Jason Wilhelm started a management company called TalentXEntertainment to recruit TikTok stars and create collab houses including SwayLA and the Hype house.  They have created two houses that have over a million followers on their personal accounts. The owners of the company make sure that they are not using the house just for fun and freetime, Wilhelm says, “You wake up and they’re just filming, you walk in the house and they’re filming, it’s pretty remarkable.” 

The Hype House was the first Tiktok collab house created. Chase Hudson, a Tik Tok star with 13.5 million followers, also known as “lilhuddy”signed the lease on this house in November of 2019. The Hype House is filled with many famous Tik Tok stars with millions of followers. Sam Sheffer, a youtuber and technologist, says about the house, “It’s a brilliant move for power players on these platforms to lift each other up.”  The Sway House was created around the same time, but got less “hype” and caused drama between the two houses. Many people assumed the houses were made to cause drama and publicity, which started to gain the attention of other people. 

The Hype House consists of 21 members, but only four live there full time. The Sway house consists of six members who all live there full time. Although The Sway House is known to be more realistic, fans seem to obsess over the Hype House more. The Hype house has 7.5 million followers on Tik Tok while the Sway House has 1.3 million. In the Hype House, 17 of the members go there and invite other people to make videos and get more likes on the app. 

Many people within the two houses are rumored to be dating. Morgan Kellogg, a freshman at Battlefield, says, “I think Tik Tok is better now because it’s starting to make couples within both houses and I feel like I am on Tik Tok more to see who’s dating who.” The most famous Tik Tok star, Charli D’amelio, with 25 million followers, announced in Hawaii that she was dating Chase Hudson and fans went wild. Other members of the Hype House create speculations about people dating to gain followers more efficiently.  

The Hype House and Sway House are continually gaining followers everyday. Tik Tok is also gaining many active users and many people that check the app constantly.  The competition between the two houses is still arising, but they are not losing any attention. Tik Tok is also gaining many active users and many people that check the app constantly.