3 Pennsylvania investors bought an abandoned school for $100,000; turned it into 31 apartments (Image Credit: Instagram/ @jessewig)
The completed development included 27 one-bedroom apartments and four two-bedroom apartments. The homes combined features expected from newly renovated apartments with details inherited from the former school. Modern kitchens, bathrooms and other residential amenities were installed, while the original architecture helped keep the property from feeling like a completely new building. That mixture was part of the appeal. Instead of hiding the building’s history, the renovation incorporated it into the finished homes.
In 2019, three friends bought an abandoned school building in Homestead, Pennsylvania, for just $100,000. Over the next 18 months, they spent roughly $3.3 million transforming the former school into a 31-unit apartment building. In interviews with CNBC Make It, the investors detailed how they took on the unusual conversion and eventually filled all 31 apartments within six months of opening them for rent. The completed property has 31 apartments, including one- and two-bedroom units.
Ideas included turning it into a co-working space, a concert venue or a beer garden, according to CNBC Make It. A high school that sat empty for years is now home to dozens of people, after three Pennsylvania investors turned its old classrooms into apartments. What followed was far more expensive than the purchase price. The project involved gutting and rebuilding much of the interior while keeping some of the features that made the building recognisable as a school. The property had been sitting vacant for years when the three investors, Jesse Wig, Adam Colucci and Dan Spanovich, purchased it. Rather than starting with a traditional apartment building, they were dealing with a former high school that had already seen better days. The partners initially considered several different uses for the building. The investors did not simply divide the old school into identical rental units. The renovation involved rebuilding the former classrooms as modern apartments while retaining several details from the building’s past. Former classrooms were converted into living spaces with kitchens and bathrooms, while features such as the building’s high ceilings and large windows helped give the apartments a distinctive character. Some of the old school features were deliberately kept rather than removed. Original chalkboards remain in some apartments, providing an obvious reminder of what the rooms were once used for. The building’s shared spaces also received new purposes. The former auditorium, for example, was restored rather than simply stripped out. The renovation preserved parts of its original character while turning it into a communal area for residents. The gymnasium was given another life as well. The old basketball court was retained, while the space was adapted into a fitness area. Instead of becoming unusable remnants of an abandoned school, these large spaces became amenities for the people living in the building.
