We spent $1 on an abandoned baseball stadium, and $14 million to convert it into luxury apartments—take a look inside

“Initially, people thought that we were crazy for wanting to turn an abandoned baseball stadium into apartments,” Cox, the principal at Core Redevelopment, tells CNBC Make It.

Bush Stadium was home to the Indianapolis Indians from 1931 to 1996. After that, it was used as a dirt track for several years and eventually as a car storage site before it was abandoned.

In 2011, Watson was the board chair of Indiana Landmarks, a historic preservation nonprofit organization in the state, when they were asked to come up with ideas for saving Bush Stadium.

Watson says the stadium had been abandoned for several years and was in danger of being torn down entirely. Some of the ideas that he and the Indiana Landmarks organization had for the stadium included turning it into apartments or renovating it and using it for soccer and baseball again, but the latter plan didn’t go anywhere due to a lack of funding.

“About nine months later, [the city] approached me again and said, ‘If you don’t do that idea you came up with to turn it into apartments, it’s going to be lost. They’re going to tear it down.’ So, we put together a team and explored whether or not it was possible to do it,” Watson says.

In 2011, Cox, Watson, and his two sons took ownership of the stadium, according to documents reviewed by CNBC Make It. The city of Indianapolis transferred the property’s deed to the Indiana Landmarks for $10 and the historic preservation nonprofit organization handed it over to the partners for $1.

“Often cities dispose of properties to nonprofits for disposition,” Watson says. “That is what happened here.”

As part of the deal with the city of Indianapolis to get the stadium, Core Redevelopment was mandated to build an additional 144 apartments outside of the stadium in four adjacent buildings, which they named Stadium Flats.

The Stadium Flats addition was completed about a year after the Stadium Lofts opened and cost around $13 million. By the time Stadium Flats opened in July 2014, all of the apartments were leased. It consists of 90 1-bedroom apartments, 48 2-bedroom apartments, and 6 1-bedroom apartments with dens. The rents range from $1,067 to $1,470.

Cox, Watson, and his sons had a budget of $14 million for the Stadium Lofts conversion and, in the end, spent roughly $13.8 million. The amount includes $1 million from Cox, Watson and each of his sons, a $6.5 million mortgage, $5.3 million in grants from the city of Indianapolis, and the $1 acquisition cost.

The mortgage has since been paid off and replaced with long-term permanent financing, Watson says.

The stadium’s renovation began in August 2011 and was completed in a little under two years. By the time it opened in July 2013, all 138 apartments had been leased.

It was converted into 95 1-bedroom apartments, 26 2-bedroom apartments, and 17 lofts. Rent in the complex ranges from $900 to $1,700 and each apartment has a washer and dryer.

“Our biggest concern when we started this project was, ‘Who is going to show up and rent it?’ There wasn’t much housing in the neighborhood. There wasn’t much economic activity in the neighborhood,” Watson says. “We were kind of pioneers when we did this project, so we were concerned about its success, and we underwrote it conservatively.”

The stadium is located in Marion County, Indiana. As of April 2024, the median rent for all bedroom counts and property types in Marion, IN is $600. This is 70% lower than the national average, according to Zumper.

Cox admits turning the stadium into a residential space was a tough project for the group from a technical standpoint. When they took ownership, they needed to solve the many issues the property already had while still maintaining its character.

Some of the original stadium features Watson and Cox kept include the scoreboard, the old ticket booths and the press box, and they even put the base pads back in the existing field to pay homage to what was there before.

“We designed it such that when you walked in, you felt like you were walking into a historic stadium rather than an apartment building,” Watson says.

The developers also installed balconies made of chain link fencing “to create that stadium-type appeal,” Watson says.

“One of the unconventional things we did was we exposed all the concrete floors in the units,” he added.

The building’s fitness center has photos of the old stadium hanging throughout. The complex also offers residents several study rooms. The developers built a courtyard for residents to hang out next to the field that includes a gas fireplace and tables and chairs.

Cox says seeing the completed transformation of the once-abandoned stadium was “the culmination of a childhood dream” in a way.

“I played baseball growing up and I always thought maybe I’d get into the Hall of Fame as a baseball player,” he says.

Watson adds it was also amazing to see the amount of interest from the people of Indianapolis when Stadium Lofts opened.

“Almost everybody had been here for a baseball game sometime during their lifetime, so the connections were deep, and people couldn’t wait to come to the project,” Watson says.

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