In 2019, Adam Colucci, Dan Spanovich, and Jesse Wig bought Bowtie High School for $100,000 in Homestead, Pennsylvania.
“We were thinking of turning it into a WeWork space, a concert hall, a beer garden. We had no shortage of ideas on what to do with the space,” Adam Colucci said in a feature for CNBC Make It.
“But after seeking consult and advice, we realized that residential is the best path forward for this building.”
Of the 31 units, 27 of them are one-bedroom apartments and four are two-bedrooms.
Colucci, Spanovich, and Wig (who are 36, 43, and 36 respectively) split the profits — and expenses — based on their proportional share within the project.
“A one-bedroom apartment rents for about $1,400 a month, and a two-bedroom rents for $1,600 a month,” Colucci said.
Before the building was sold to the friend group, it had sat vacant for nearly 10 years. The renovations, which caused nearly $3.3 million, took 18 months to complete.
The three — who are designers as well as investors — used their respective skills to gut, convert, and transform the classrooms into livable spaces.
Although they all had a hand in designing the layout of the apartments, Colucci largely focused on maintaining the historical nature of the building, from the 12-foot high ceilings to the original terrazzo floors.
“We worked closely with the National Park Services to ensure it kept its historical significance,” he said. “We went out of our way to ensure the school kept its historical look.”
When it comes to the school’s auditorium — which serves as a common area for the building’s residents — Spanovich considers it to be “the most dramatic feature” of Bowtie High.
“We restored this space pretty much from ruin,” Spanovich said. “All of the plaster was failing, and we built that, kept all of the original flooring in the space, everything’s been professionally furnished.”
“This old bookshelf came from the space,” he added, as he leaned against the towering wooden shelf, “and we were able to incorporate that back into the auditorium.”
Down the hall from the auditorium is the gym: filled with free weights, treadmills, and cardio equipment.
Although they took out the gym’s bleachers and used the space to build storage units, the trio kept the original Bowtie High basketball court intact.
The building’s most radical transformations are in the apartments themselves, where the units have been converted into kitchens, bedrooms, and bathrooms.
But the apartments, too, have vestiges of the original school running through them.
In one apartment, Wig pointed out a chalkboard tucked behind a tenant’s couch, which was salvaged from a classroom.
After construction was complete and new tenants moved in, the trio invested the money made from the Bowtie building into the Schwab school — another abandoned school on the same street — which proved to be a much more challenging project.
“When we first entered the building, there were trees growing on the first floor and water had leaked down from the top floor,” Spanovich told CNBC Make It in a follow up interview.
“Schwab was a building that a lot of people in the community had looked at and had come to the conclusion that it just couldn’t be done. That challenge is really what drives my partners and I.”
In 2023, Spanovich, Wig, and Colucci purchased the Schwab school for $90,000 and spent $4.5 million converting it into a 33-unit apartment building.
“The best part about these is bringing these old buildings back to life,” Spanovich said.
“The feeling that you get when you walk into this building, knowing what it looked like before and knowing that people said it just couldn’t be done, and seeing life in the building...it’s the best feeling in the world.”
When a recent Instagram post recounted the story of Bowtie High, people showed their appreciation for the unique renovation project.
“More of this,” one commenter said. “Refurbish and repurpose the old before building new. So many abandoned buildings across the country waiting for new use.”
“Someone needs to do this with all of the empty office space in San Francisco,” another person wrote in agreement.
“I like when they took a few churches and made them into homes as well,” another person commented, in reference to a string of churches that have converted their property into affordable housing in recent years.
“This is a great example of creative real estate development,” one person praised. “Turning an abandoned school into a thriving apartment complex while preserving its character. It’s proof that vision and investment can breathe new life into overlooked properties!”
See a tour of the Bow Tie building below:
Header images via Adam Colucci
