Bryan and Sarah Baeumler’s Kids Are Getting an Education on ‘Renovation Island’

What’s it like to grow up on Renovation Island? Ask Bryan and Sarah Baeumler’s kids — Quintyn, Charlotte, Lincoln, and Josephine — who are coming of age as their parents rehab and operate Caerula Mar Club on the Bahamian island of Andros.

“For the better part of the last year and a half, the kids have been living and playing and learning at a hotel,” Bryan said in a Season 2 episode.

And having their children on hand at the resort has helped Bryan and Sarah “keep things in perspective,” he told viewers.

“You know, I see five loads of sand, and I think, ‘I have to get the machine here and spread it out. Then, we have to rake it, make it look good,’” Bryan added. “The kids see a place to explore and somewhere to have fun so that kind of helps ground everything and just remind us not what we’re doing but why we’re doing it.”

In a Renovation Island episode that aired last year, Sarah explained how the kids were getting their education. “When we first arrived on the island, we basically home-schooled our children for quite a few months,” she said. “But given the state of the property, we are in full construction mode, and to have the three youngest ones running around, it just isn’t safe. So they will all be going to a local school because, for them, they need a proper school environment.”

And they had to make a “big decision” for Quintyn, their oldest. “He’s 14, and Bryan and I both thought it was really important for him to have a proper high school education, so we’re actually sending him off-island, and he will live in a boarding school,” Sarah said. “And the reality is, Quintyn’s only a 20-minute flight away.”

In the first clip, Sarah told viewers that she hopes the couple’s four kids will have fond memories of their time on Andros Island and be “so thankful for this opportunity.”

She also observed how life in the Bahamas had already impacted the brood. “I think our children have experienced so much on this island that they have really grown as people, and I think that makes us, as parents, feel like we did the right thing,” she said. “We showed them a different part of the world, and [with] the people that they’ve met and the work that they’ve had to put in, hopefully, they will understand the benefit as they grow older.”

In 2019, Sarah and Bryan shared with RBC how they’re teaching their kids about money — and the importance of saving. “Having a savings account might not be as cool as having the latest toy, but understanding the value of things in the short term versus the long term is important. And if you save and raise the money for something you really want, you develop a pride of ownership,” Bryan said.

Sarah and Bryan recalled that when Quintyn wanted to use all his income to buy a skimboard, they taught him about compound interest. And when Charlotte wanted a phone, they discussed the prospect of her babysitting her younger sister.

“Giving your kids some measure of responsibility can teach them the concept of working for money. And when they work for cash — or for something they want — there is more weight and significance attached to the item purchased,” Sarah said.