diff --git a/cmake/CMakeLists.txt b/cmake/CMakeLists.txt
index 5a30cd5aa5..14961209c8 100644
--- a/cmake/CMakeLists.txt
+++ b/cmake/CMakeLists.txt
@@ -841,8 +841,7 @@ if(BUILD_SHARED_LIBS)
   set(LIBLAMMPS_SHARED_BINARY ${MY_BUILD_DIR}/liblammps${LAMMPS_MACHINE}${CMAKE_SHARED_LIBRARY_SUFFIX})
   if(Python_EXECUTABLE)
     add_custom_target(
-      install-python ${CMAKE_COMMAND} -E remove_directory build
-      COMMAND ${Python_EXECUTABLE} ${LAMMPS_PYTHON_DIR}/install.py -p ${LAMMPS_PYTHON_DIR}/lammps
+      install-python ${Python_EXECUTABLE} ${LAMMPS_PYTHON_DIR}/install.py -p ${LAMMPS_PYTHON_DIR}/lammps
               -l ${LIBLAMMPS_SHARED_BINARY} -w ${MY_BUILD_DIR}
       COMMENT "Installing LAMMPS Python module")
   else()
diff --git a/python/install.py b/python/install.py
index 591e8525dc..561e93caa9 100644
--- a/python/install.py
+++ b/python/install.py
@@ -59,6 +59,10 @@ olddir = os.path.abspath('.')
 os.chdir(os.path.dirname(args.package))
 
 # remove any wheel files left over from previous calls
+if os.path.isdir(os.path.join(olddir,"build")):
+  print("Cleaning old build directory")
+  shutil.rmtree(os.path.join(olddir,"build"))
+
 print("Purging existing wheels...")
 for wheel in glob.glob('lammps-*.whl'):
   print("deleting " + wheel)