I Tried to Buy a WeWork Cofounder’s $21 Million House

Late last year, Miguel McKelvey, the lesser known of WeWork’s two co-founders, listed his Greenwich Village townhouse for $21 million.

I thought it’d be fun and instructive to tour McKelvey’s digs just a few blocks north of NYU. The residence is a 6,000 square foot modernist house with a plunge pool and an open glass atrium overlooking a garden and has a notorious past: It was the site of an accidental bombing by the Weather Underground. In 1970, members of the radical leftist group destroyed the home building bombs out of dynamite and nails in the basement. What, exactly, can a person buy with millions from an embattled startup whose valuation was artificially pumped up before a disastrous IPO attempt?

A friend and I, genuinely curious as to whether normal people could view the house, emailed McKelvey’s real estate agent at Douglas Elliman, to set up a viewing.

It had been a terrible year for WeWork. The coworking startup plummeted in value and received a $10 billion bailout, after the spectacular meltdown of its IPO. Meanwhile, mass layoffs were announced and McKelvey’s partner and co-founder Adam Neumann received a $1.7 billion golden parachute.

Touring McKelvey’s home was an opportunity to view the wealth behind the smoke and mirrors of the WeWork fiasco up close. (McKelvey’s net worth is estimated at $900 million.)

A couple of pieces of art featured on the real estate listing proclaim in bold text, "We gave a party for the gods and the gods all came” and “I want to cum inside your heart,” and had caused a stir on social media. (The real estate agency would not confirm with Business Insider whether they belonged to McKelvey.)