Irwin Builders Supply site sold, auction set

An auction is set for Jan. 26 to sell a variety of home building products at the last remaining vestige of Irwin Builders Supply Corp., which was sold last month to a Hempfield-based supplier of aggregate and building products.

Wendell H. Stone Co. of Connellsville, part of Hempfield-based Stone & Co., bought the defunct Irwin Builders Supply property straddling North Huntingdon and Irwin in December for $800,000 from Compass Advisory Partners LLC of Pittsburgh. Compass is a turnaround consulting and crisis management firm for underperforming businesses.

Stone & Co. has not decided what to do with the Center Highway property it acquired in December, said Mark Stone, who owns the business with his brother, Greg.

“It’s too early to tell. There’s no plans set in stone,” he said.

Stone & Co. has 16 other facilities in Western Pennsylvania. With the new site in Irwin, “we have a few options,” Stone said.

They may have a better idea of what they will do with the property in about a month, he added.

Auctioneer Mark Ferry of Unity said he is expecting a lot of interest when most of Irwin Builders’ inventory goes up for bid, including windows, doors and kitchen and bath products.

“I got calls from all over the tri-state area. You could probably build a house” with what is going to be offered, Ferry said.

Compass Advisory Partners sold the property rather than Irwin Builders Supply because the firm was in receivership. The county court appointed Compass Advisory as the receiver in September 2017 and gave it the authority in October 2018 to sell the property.

Nick Arrington, a managing partner at Compass Advisory, could not be reached for comment.

PNC Bank had sued Irwin Builders Supply for defaulting on a $1.02 million Small Business Administration loan it obtained through PNC in December 2013 and a $2.5 million line of credit it received from PNC in October 2015. By July 2017, Irwin Builders Supply owed PNC $3.2 million, according to court filings.

Irwin Builders Supply, which was founded in 1949, was unable to turn around its finances even after selling its specialty building products division to Foundation Building Materials, a nationwide construction materials company based in Tustin, Calif. Foundation Building Materials continues to operate at its site, also along Center Highway.

Joe Napsha is a Tribune-Review staff writer. You can contact Joe at 724-836-5252 or jnapsha@tribweb.com.