A colossal mansion in Manvel, Texas that sat vacant for more than 20 years is now thriving as a commercial building, including being part of a college campus.
The “Manvel Mansion,” about 23 miles south of Houston, was built in 2001 by physician Ulysses Watkins. He and his wife started building a 63,000-square-foot residence, but construction stopped about 80% when the couple decided the house was too big, according to the current owner of the property, Jim Youngblood.
It sat empty for years until Youngblood, a partner at Renters Warehouse, a local leasing and property management company, bought it for $525,000. At first, he tried to get rid of it repeatedly, for prices as high as $3.6 million.
In 2019, he decided to change his approach. If no one wanted to live there, maybe a small business or an organization would want to rent an affordable office.
He was right.
According to Rich Drake, CEO and partner of Renters Warehouse, all but 450 square feet of space have been occupied since then.
One of the biggest tenants to lease space is Alvin Community College (ACC), whose main campus is in Alvin, Texas, just 10 minutes from Manvel.
“As a community college, we want to make sure that we provide accessibility to as many potential students or to our community as possible,” Stacy Ebert, the vice president of strategic initiatives at ACC, told Business Insider. “So having a physical presence on the west side of our service area has been a goal of ours and part of our strategic initiatives.”
The college leased 14,500 square feet and is renovating to better accommodate students. To start, ACC will offer workforce-type training, like classes for healthcare and law enforcement, but will eventually offer general education courses.
Businesses are leaning into their unique location
According to Ebert, the school isn’t leaning much into its new campus being a mansion — they’re just calling it “ACC West.” Still, some of the other businesses in the building fully lean into the mansion’s aesthetic.
Cullen Fair, the owner of Space City Treasure, a store that buys and sells everything from jewelry and designer bags to sneakers and guns, said the mansion helps bring in business.
“In people’s mansions, they tend to have valuables, so I said, ‘This is a perfect fit,'” he told BI. “This is a big building. It has a unique location, a unique story, and I could leverage this building to drive in a certain clientele.”
The Manvel Mansion is the home to other businesses like a barbershop, an insurance firm, and a church.
Here’s a look at photos of the enormous and maligned building through the years and a glimpse into its long, intriguing history.
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