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SATURDAY, SEP TEMBER 19, 2020 • KOKOMO TR I BUNE PROGRESS EDI T ION
BY TYLER JURANOVICH
KOKOMO TRIBUNE
O
ne of Kokomo’s newest
apartment complexes
already has filled up, and
its developers and others hope
that trend continues as more
apartments in the downtown
area are planned to open by the
end of this year.
The College Apartments,
located at the corner of Main
and Taylor streets, opened for
leasing in February. The 10 one-
bedroom apartments on the
building’s second floor quickly
filled up, but that hasn’t stopped
the applications from rolling in.
The 14-apartment unit rents for
$700 to $950.
“Some people were saying
how this was unaffordable, but
every time we’d show somebody
here we’d hear, ‘Oh, we like the
price. We like the location,’” said
DJ Butcher, an associate broker
for Fortune Companies, the
company that developed College
Apartments.
Butcher said the company has
been receiving emails from pro-
spective renters almost daily,
adding the apartments have
attracted some out-of-town
residents, including one from
Seattle.
The four, two-bedroom apart-
ments on the building’s first
floor are currently being con-
structed, as well as commercial
space that local developer Scott
Pitcher, of Fortune Compa-
nies, said will be occupied by
an in-town home healthcare
company. He declined to specifi-
cally name the company.
It’s been a quick transforma-
tion for the historic building.
The College Building was built in
the early 20th century and once
housed the Indiana Business
College. Much of the building’s
historical facade has been kept.
College Apartments is just
one of a handful of apartment
projects planned to open this
year in downtown.
SYCAMORE APARTMENTS
The $6 million, 58-unit
private development at the
intersection of Sycamore Street
and Apperson Way is by far the
largest of the new apartments to
open downtown this year.
The complex, largely one-
bedrooms with a smattering
of two-bedroom units, began
leasing in June. The three-build-
ing complex is owned by Four
Star Partnership and includes
new landscaping, sidewalks and
parking.
Notably, the project will
restore a historic two-story brick
house at 417 E. Sycamore St.
The house was built in the early
1880s for Dr. John F. Hender-
son, a surgeon during the Civil
War.
Following the war, he became
one of Kokomo’s earliest real
estate developers; his ventures
include a drug store, lumberyard
and hotels. In 1867, he built the
four-store Clinton House Hotel in
downtown Kokomo and was later
the founder and editor of the
Kokomo Dispatch newspaper.
TUDOR BUILDING
APARTMENTS
Work is mostly complete to
turn Kokomo’s historic Tudor
Building, 513 N. Buckeye St.,
into two floors of 10 total
apartments and one floor of
commercial space.
Kokomo attorney Sara Pitcher
and her husband, Ryan Pitcher,
are developing the project,
which included demolishing the
west side of the building to make
way for parking.
The two previously renovated
Sara Pitcher’s law office at 210
W. Walnut St. and were looking
for about a year for something
else in Kokomo to develop and
invest in before finding the
Tudor building.
“Buckeye Street is awesome
in the way that it’s growing, so
we decided to fill another hole
that needed to be filled,” Ryan
Pitcher said.
The complex is a collection of
two-bedroom and studio apart-
ments, which rent for $965 and
$650 a month, respectively.
The building first opened as
a produce shipping and packing
facility somewhere around the
turn of the 20th century, called
the S. Tudor and Co. Packing
House.
Information provided by
the Howard County Historical
Society, and printed on the back
of a Kokomo Daily Dispatch
photo from 1902 or 1903, noted
when describing the company’s
early stages at the site that
“shipping and packing depart-
ments are located in the main
section of the building, with the
offices in front.”
Shipments sent from the
Tudor Building traveled to New
York, Philadelphia and Boston.
The egg market was considered
especially important, along with
the butter trade and chickens
and “other fowls.”
The building has served
various purposes throughout its
history, like in 1950, when it was
home to a group called the Orga-
nized Reserved Corps, and in
1970, when it served as a storage
area for Gentry’s Furniture.
It has, however, been vacant
for decades before finding new
life as apartments and commer-
cial space.
MONROE STREET
APARTMENTS
Just a 5-minute walk from
the Tudor Building at 120
W. Monroe St. is a two-story
apartment complex with four
apartments on each floor.
The project is led by Butcher
and began construction in
March. Units currently lease for
$650 for one bedroom and $725
for two bedrooms.
The complex is smaller than
the others in the downtown
area, but still has plenty of
character. A Jules Muck graffiti
work of a dog graces the build-
ing’s west side and the building’s
original beams and brick wall
will be located in some of the
apartments.
“We would’ve loved to keep
a lot of the brick exposed, but
insulating it would have been
difficult,” Butcher said. “It
would’ve looked cool, but the
tenants wouldn’t have liked the
bill, I’m sure.”
In the 1930s, according to
Butcher, the building used to be
a wholesale grocery store. Before
being bought by Butcher, it was
a motorcycle club.
SUPERIOR STREET
APARTMENTS
One of Kokomo’s most recent
apartment projects will be
located in the 400 block of West
Superior Street, at the site of
the former Turner MFG Co.
building, near Foster Park.
The complex will include
a mix of eight two-bedroom
apartments for $899 a month
and eight one-bedroom apart-
ments for $725 a month and will
be developed by Fortune Com-
panies.
The project faced some
pushback from local homeown-
ers, business owners and some
members of the city council, but
did narrowly pass a rezoning
change from the council in
February and then a final gov-
ernmental approval from the
plan commission in May.
Construction is currently
ongoing.
DOWNTOWN FOR RENT
CITY’S CENTER CONTINUES TO BE HOTSPOT FOR NEW APARTMENTS
COMMERCE
SPOTLIGHT
College Apartments:
The
College Building at the corner
of Taylor and Main streets on
January 30, 2020.
Sycamore Apartments:
New apartments at Sycamore and Apperson are being built by Fortune
Developments in the downtown Kokomo area.
(Kokomo Tribune file photos)
