Housing near Goodwill Industries of Central Florida

04Getting to Goodwill's headquarters

Goodwill of Central Florida's headquarters sits on South Orange Blossom Trail, and the thirteen homes reach it at very different lengths depending on the cluster. Fruit Tree Home, south of downtown in Holden Heights, is the closest at about 9 minutes. Amelia’s Arena Retreat in Parramore is about 13 minutes, tied with Piedmont in Washington Shores and also with the Dollins and Sunset Lake houses, both also in Washington Shores. Behind those, Meet. Play. Stay. runs about 16 minutes, the Entertainment and Cozy houses about 17, The Clue House about 18, Downtown & Stadium Cozy Retreat about 20, WinterPark Home about 22, and Wekiwa Home, farthest out in Hiawassee, about 23.

Orange Blossom Trail, also called US-441, is the road the headquarters sits on, and it is the same road that carries Nikki's Place, the soul food kitchen that has served the Washington Shores area since 1999, and the pharmacies for that side of town. I-4 and SR-408 both reach it from every cluster of homes; SR-408 is a tolled expressway, so a SunPass or E-PASS transponder is worth setting up in the first week of a longer stay, since paying by plate works too but costs more per trip. All of these are typical road-routing times without traffic, and Orlando's morning and evening rush hours add the most to the longer routes on this list, the Katherine and Wekiwa houses especially.

05Where the homes sit around the headquarters

Distance from the centre of the map below is drive time, not miles, and each home sits at its real compass bearing from the headquarters. Holden Heights, home to Fruit Tree Home, is the only entry in the South of Downtown group, about 9 minutes out. Parramore, home to Amelia’s Arena Retreat, is the lone Downtown Orlando entry, about 13 minutes out. West Orlando has five homes on the map, tied with Northwest Orlando for the most of any group: the Piedmont, Dollins and Sunset Lake houses in Washington Shores cluster at about 13 minutes, Meet. Play. Stay. in Malibu Groves sits at about 16, and Wekiwa Home, out in Hiawassee, is the farthest point on the map at about 23. Northwest Orlando is the other five-home group: the Entertainment and Cozy houses near Pine Hills at about 17 minutes, The Clue House close by at about 18, Downtown & Stadium Cozy Retreat at about 20, and WinterPark Home in Lockhart at about 22.

A house on one side of the map is not automatically the better pick just because it looks closer at a glance; two homes in different directions can land on the same number of minutes, which is why the chart above and this map work best read together. The Parramore and Holden Heights pages cover the close-in side, Washington Shores covers the stadium side of West Orlando, and Pine Hills, Rosemont and Lockhart cover the northwest. A specialist who splits time between the headquarters and a store or donation center elsewhere in the region can use the map to judge which direction keeps the overall driving reasonable, not just the one number to this address.

06A month near Goodwill's headquarters

A relocating district or store manager coming in from another market is usually choosing a neighborhood at the same time as starting the job. A furnished house near the headquarters, with a full kitchen from the first night, buys one to three months to see the west side, downtown and the northwest before signing a lease anywhere, and a partner or kids moving at the same time do not need a second hotel room while that search happens.

Mission and workforce-program specialists often move between more than one site in their first weeks, since the organization runs stores and job-training centers across the region as well as the headquarters. A house on the close-in side keeps the drive to the Trail short no matter which direction the day's first stop is in, with a private driveway so a rental car is never left hunting for a space on the street. Corporate staff on a temporary assignment tend to book a narrower window, a few weeks to a couple of months, and lean on the same full kitchen and laundry so a short project does not turn into a month of takeout.

A new hire house-hunting after a transfer uses the stay differently again. It buys time to actually see the neighborhoods in person instead of picking one from listing photos before the moving truck arrives, and a one-month booking is the common length for that search. When it runs long, the agreement extends by the month instead of forcing a second move partway through. Our corporate housing and relocation and long-stay pages cover the agreement itself in general terms; this page is about the drive to this specific headquarters and the homes nearest it.

07The homes closest to the Goodwill campus

Three of our homes sit within a 13-minute drive of the headquarters or closer: the 25th Street House, the Amelia House and the Piedmont House. The Dollins and Sunset Lake houses, both also in Washington Shores, land in that same 13-minute band, so ask about those two as well if one of the three below is already booked. A closer look at each of the three follows.

South of Downtown

Holden Heights

Fruit Tree Home

3 bd 2 ba Sleeps 10

6 min downtown · 5 min ORMC · 13 min Universal

Travel Nurse & MedicalInsurance & Displacement

Downtown Orlando

Parramore / Downtown Edge

Amelia’s Arena Retreat

4 bd 2 ba Sleeps 8

7 min downtown · 9 min ORMC · 16 min Universal

Travel Nurse & MedicalInsurance & Displacement

West Orlando

Washington Shores

Piedmont

4 bd 3 ba Sleeps 14

11 min downtown · 11 min ORMC · 13 min Universal

Travel Nurse & MedicalInsurance & Displacement

Fruit Tree Home

About 9 minutes from the headquarters in Holden Heights, this three-bedroom, two-bathroom bungalow was renovated with a galley kitchen, quartz-look counters and stainless steel appliances, plus full-size laundry on site and keyless entry. It carries 142 Airbnb reviews at a 4.83 rating, the most of any home in the portfolio. The bedrooms run small, which suits one relocating employee comfortably and a family of four adequately, and the fenced backyard has mature shade trees. The block is a modest, older residential street south of downtown, and the laundry sits in a utility area off the back porch instead of a dedicated room, details the listing states plainly.

Amelia’s Arena Retreat

About 13 minutes away in Parramore, Amelia’s Arena Retreat is a four-bedroom, two-bathroom house renovated with white shaker cabinets, granite-look counters and wood-look plank floors, with one bedroom that has its own attached bathroom, useful when two people on the same stay want separate space in the mornings. A dining area seats four, and a fenced backyard with mature shade trees sits behind the house. The block is close-set, like much of Parramore, and the exterior stucco shows some patching, typical of an older neighborhood.

Piedmont

Also about 13 minutes away, in Washington Shores, Piedmont has an open living and dining area under a vaulted ceiling, marble-look tile throughout, and a concrete parking pad out front big enough for several vehicles, useful during a relocation when more than one car needs somewhere to sit overnight. A game room off the living area has a foosball table, left over from the house's life as a group rental and easy to ignore on a work stay. It has four bedrooms and three bathrooms on a quiet, established block.

08Billing and paperwork for a relocating employee

The written agreement can name Goodwill Industries of Central Florida directly, a relocation coordinator, or the employee, whichever the organization prefers, and it lists the home, the dates, the rate and the deposit in plain terms before anyone moves in. Invoices go out monthly and itemized, in a form an HR or accounts-payable department can process directly, without the line-by-line detail of a hotel folio. A W-9 and a certificate of insurance are available on request, since Libema carries a commercial landlord liability policy.

• A written agreement naming the home, the dates, the rate and the deposit
• A monthly itemized invoice addressed to the organization or the employee
• A W-9 and certificate of insurance on request

Net-30 terms are available on a signed agreement or a purchase order for an established organization, with the first booking paid up front while that paperwork is arranged. Extensions run month by month at the same terms, so a house-hunt or an assignment that stretches past the first month does not mean packing up and moving to a different home partway through it. Give notice as early as you can once a one-month plan looks like becoming two, since a house held for you is a house we are not offering to the next inquiry. Our guide on booking temporary housing for an employee covers the paperwork side for a coordinator in more depth.

09Around Parramore, Holden Heights and Washington Shores

Parramore and Holden Heights, home to the Amelia and 25th Street houses, are the close-in side of the corridor the headquarters sits on. A Publix on South Orange Avenue covers groceries near Holden Heights, and LYNX buses run along Orange Blossom Trail like most of the metro's main roads, connecting toward LYNX Central, the system's downtown hub, for anyone who wants to leave the car parked some days. Lake Eola Park, with its roughly one-mile loop and Sunday farmers market, is about 8 minutes from both houses.

Holden-Parramore Historic District-1 · Visitor7 · CC BY-SA 3.0 · resized from 5472x3648

Washington Shores, around Piedmont, sits on the other side of that same corridor. Nikki's Place and the pharmacies along Orange Blossom Trail and West Colonial Drive cover the everyday errands, and Camping World Stadium is about 7 minutes from Piedmont's front door, with Lake Lorna Doone Park's walking loop and splash pad close enough for an evening out of the house. None of the three closest homes is walkable to the headquarters itself, so plan on driving for the day-to-day commute. The Parramore, Holden Heights and Washington Shores neighborhood pages go further on groceries, food and parks.

10Around Pine Hills and Lockhart

Five of our homes sit farther out, from about 17 to 22 minutes from the headquarters: the Entertainment, Cozy, Head Avenue and Londonderry houses in Pine Hills, and WinterPark Home in Lockhart. Our Pine Hills and northwest Orlando area guide covers this cluster in full. Presidente Supermarket on North Pine Hills Road is a Latin grocer with a cafeteria and juice counter built in, and a few blocks south on West Colonial Drive, Caribbean Supercenter and Enson Market anchor the area's Caribbean and Asian shopping. The Walmart Supercenter on West Princeton Street is the closest big box for a full pantry restock.

The everyday food here is Caribbean and Latin: Island Jam Caribbean Cuisine on North Pine Hills Road is known for griot and fried plantains, and Golden Krust at West Colonial and North Kirkman covers Jamaican beef patties and jerk chicken. Barnett Park, 159 acres on West Colonial Drive, has a free splash pad, playgrounds, walking trails and courts for basketball and volleyball, and the Silver Star Recreation Center adds a second option nearby. SR-408 is the spine connecting this cluster back to the Trail and the headquarters, with Silver Star Road, Pine Hills Road and Kirkman Road handling the local trips.

11What's in the house

Every home comes furnished and ready from the first night, whether the stay runs one month or three, with the furniture, the beds and the kitchen already in place so a relocating employee is not buying a first set of pots and pans on top of everything else a move involves. The exact inclusions vary a little by house and are confirmed in writing when you book.

Exact inclusions vary a little by home and are confirmed in writing when you book.

On the three homes profiled above: Fruit Tree Home has full-size laundry on site and keyless entry, Amelia’s Arena Retreat has a bedroom with its own attached bathroom, and Piedmont has a parking pad that fits several vehicles. All three publish a full street address on the site, among six of the thirteen that do, which makes it easy to put an exact location on an expense report or a relocation form before anyone arrives. None of the thirteen homes has a pool; they are residential houses. Bed and bath counts are the counts in each home's own listing, and a sofa is never counted as a bed.

12What guests said

These are real reviews from Fruit Tree Home's own Airbnb listing, quoted exactly as written, with the guest's name and the month they stayed. It is the home closest to the Goodwill headquarters and the one with the most reviews of any house in the portfolio, so it is also the deepest record we have of what a stay here is actually like. Every home on the site carries its own set of real reviews, and the full collection sits on our reviews page.