BLOOMFIELD – Years ago, the old brick buildings housed factories that produced woolen blankets, extension cords and electronic components. One was a downtown five-and-dime store.

Nowadays, they are business sites for hundreds of wholesale auto dealers who in many cases never set foot in their offices.

Rural Greene County has become a hub for more than 640 individual car sellers from around the nation who have established offices in the long-empty factories.

By establishing a storefront office and obtaining the necessary licenses, certificates and insurance, the absentee tenants can legally buy and sell cars at dealer auctions around the state.

State law mandates that these car wholesalers have an actual business office in Indiana. And Chicago-based Dealer Auction Access supplies everything the wholesalers need: help establishing themselves in good standing with the Indiana secretary of state, dealers’ insurance, plus a 100-square-foot office complete with walls, a door, a desk and a chair – required by statute.

The Dealer Auction Access website says it’s the largest “host” of wholesale license holders in Indiana. Their buildings in Greene County, which rent offices for $300 per month, each employ a 9-to-5 secretary who sits at a reception desk answering the phone, allowing access to the offices and forwarding mail to the renters wherever they reside.

Tiffany Fleming oversees the offices at the Old Woolen Mill in Bloomfield. On a recent morning, the 26-year-old lamented a lightning strike that had disabled her phone and Internet service. The front doors stood propped open, letting in fresh air circulated by two fans; the building is not air-conditioned, and a few windows are cracked.

She confirmed that the building’s 192 tenants are seldom on-site, although their names are listed on a plastic-canvas sign that is stretched out front facing Main Street.

Most days, the only people she encounters are the mailman and curious residents who stop by to inquire about the business and ask to take a look around the historic building, which a former owner had hoped to transform into luxury condominiums.

The only vehicle in the gravel parking lot is Fleming’s emerald green Jeep Grand Cherokee.

Adrian Kiglies is part owner and vice president of Dealer Auction Access. He knows some people question the legitimacy of his business, but he says everything is above board.

The Indiana Secretary of State’s Office, which has taken over wholesale car dealer oversight from the Bureau of Motor Vehicles, agreed: Kiglies’ business is legal.

Kiglies said Dealer Auction Access helps people he calls “the little guys” break into the automobile wholesale business and make a living as their own boss.

He said the law does not require that the business people who rent offices in his buildings be on site, just that they establish a legitimate Indiana business address.

They must buy or sell at least 120 cars a year to keep a wholesale license.

“They are not required to be there; they are required to have an address,” Kiglies explained. “We work closely with the dealer services office in Indianapolis to make sure our people are in compliance with the law from the very beginning.”

The building directory lists all of the tenants, such as Infinity Auto Mart in Suite 203, Mancini Motors in Suite 218, Roberto’s Auto Sales in Suite 316, Luxury Cars in Suite 426 and Your Blessing Has Arrived Auto Sales, Suite 447.

Kiglies is an entrepreneur who was seeking a way to make money while also helping people who want to start up their own business.

“We thought this would be a good thing to pursue, and we started seeing some buildings come up for sale that could become part of our business,” he said.

Greene County is a good location, he said, with affordable space that’s a reasonable driving distance from the airport and auto auctions in Indianapolis – in case tenants want to come by their offices.

Dealer Auction Access purchased its first Greene County building, the old woolen mill on the west edge of Bloomfield, for $80,000 in January 2009. Just five months later, the company bought two buildings on Vincennes Street in Linton, an abandoned plant and the old Murphy store, each for $85,000.

When word first got out about the long-vacant buildings being sold, there was hope for a rebirth of manufacturing, the return of lost jobs. But as Kiglies admits, his enterprise does not employ more than a few secretaries and a small work crew that remodels the buildings and erects office walls.

In all, Dealer Auction Access has 20 employees, he said.