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18 • Thursday, August 6, 2020
OVER THE MOUNTAIN JOURNAL
HOME IMPROVEMENT
GOOD MOVE Homewood Couple Donates House to Build UP
By Rubin E. Grant
Matt and Angela Leigh and their daughters, Emery and Frances, at their new home, built on the same site where their old home, right, used to be. The house was moved to Titusville across from Booker T. Washington K-8 School in Birmingham.
Who’s the BOSS
Cahaba Heights Residents Take Off on Their Own With Building and Remodeling Company By Emily Williams In November, Cahaba Heights residents Jessie and Billy Barnhill embarked on a new way of life with their two children. The couple started Barnhill Homes, a family-owned and -operated building and remodeling company. Though becoming their own bosses was a new experience, the work is
something both are familiar with, each growing up with parents who operated construction-related businesses. “Growing up, my father owned a door and window company – a millwork company – where they supply doors and windows and trim to new construction houses,” he said. Billy was 12 when his dad started his company, and he quickly began
Build UP accepts donated houses and teaches children – as young as the eighth grade in its six-year program – about the construction industry, allowing them to learn a range of construction skills through rebuilding donated homes and earn academic credit. Students also earn money through renovating the houses and eventually own the homes they work on and can live in them or rent them. Students graduate two years after a traditional high school program with certifications in a number of construction trades. Build UP began in Ensley, but earlier this year it was selected as part of a $10 million Fannie Mae Innovation Challenge. The award, one of five proposals selected nationwide by the government-sponsored mortgage company, will allow Build UP to start enrolling students in the Titusville and Graymont areas of Birmingham. “Students are receiving both mentorship and guidance while also developing skills along the way,” Martin said. “They also get paid, so they are learning financial literacy and budgeting at an earlier age. It exposes them to all kinds of responsibilities.” The donated homes Build UP receives are shipped to Titusville and students then rehab the homes. Build UP accepted its first house See BUILDUP, page 19
Though becoming their own bosses was a new experience for Jessie and Billy Barnhill, the work is something both are familiar with, each growing up with parents who operated construction-related businesses.
Photo courtesy Barnhill family
Journal photos by Jordan Wald
W
hen Matt and Angela Leigh got married in 2012, they bought a three-bedroom house in the Edgewood community of Homewood across the street from Gianmarco’s Restaurant. Matt Leigh described the house as perfect, since they didn’t have any children. But after the birth of their daughters, Emery and Frances, now ages 5 and 3, the house quickly became too small. “We needed more space,” Matt Leigh said. But rather than moving elsewhere or demolishing their house to build a more spacious one, the Leighs decided to donate the house itself and build a new house on their lot. “We liked the house a lot and didn’t want to just tear it down,” Matt Leigh said. “We saw someone moving a house down the street from us and I had never seen a house loaded and moved before.” Leigh quickly found out about Build UP, also known as Build Urban Prosperity, a non-profit workforce training program that was founded in 2018 by Mark Martin, who is chief executive officer, has had a lengthy career in education and lives in Edgewood.
Build UP
working for his father when he could – through his time at Chelsea High School and all the way up until he began working for Signature Homes in 2015. Jessie, meanwhile, grew up in Washington, D.C., where her parents worked in the commercial sheetrock industry. “My parents did framing and sheetrock for grocery stores, department stores, apartment complexes and so on,” she said. While attending college at the University of Alabama, the couple met through mutual friends. After college, Billy spent 7 years in the Alabama Army National Guard, See BARNHILL, page 20
