Housing near Southwest Airlines

04Getting to Orlando International Airport from each cluster

Fruit Tree Home, in Holden Heights south of downtown, is the closest of the thirteen homes to MCO, at about 26 minutes by road. Game Day Getaway-Downtown Orlando and City and Stadium Sanctuary Vibes, both in Washington Shores, are about 29 minutes. Amelia’s Arena Retreat, on the downtown edge in Parramore, is about 30, and Meet. Play. Stay. in Malibu Groves is about 31. The Clue House, Piedmont, Entertainment Home and Cozy Home run about 33 minutes each. Downtown & Stadium Cozy Retreat is about 36, WinterPark Home about 38, and Wekiwa Home, the farthest of the thirteen from MCO, is about 39.

Terminal C, Orlando International Airport · Olga Ernst · CC BY-SA 4.0 · resized from 4564x3238

Every figure above is a typical road-routing time without traffic. The route from the close-in and west-side homes runs SR-408 to SR-528 and on to the terminal. From the northwest cluster, Pine Hills, Rosemont and Lockhart, the drive first reaches SR-408 before the same SR-528 leg, which accounts for most of the gap between those homes and the closer clusters.

The three closest neighborhoods, Holden Heights, Parramore and Washington Shores, all sit on the close-in south and west side of the city, and Malibu Groves is a short distance further out along the same corridor. Northwest Orlando, where the Head Avenue, Katherine, Entertainment, Londonderry and Cozy houses sit, adds the extra minutes of first reaching SR-408 from farther out before that same SR-528 leg to the airport. Wekiwa Home, on the far west edge in Hiawassee, carries the longest number on this page, which is the plain tradeoff for its quieter streets and its distance from the city's center of gravity.

05Where the homes sit around MCO

The map places each home at its real compass bearing and drive time from Orlando International Airport, not a straight-line distance. Two homes that sit nowhere near each other for a downtown trip can land close to the same number of minutes on this particular leg, because SR-408 and SR-528 reach the airport from a different angle than the roads that reach downtown or the hospitals.

Use the map together with the exact minutes in the section above rather than in place of them. If two homes land close on the airport leg, check each one's own page for its drive to downtown, to a hospital, or to the grocery stores in its area guide, since those numbers do not move together the way the airport numbers do.

For a crew member weighing two similar options, the difference the map shows often comes down to which other trips matter during the same stay. A trainee spending a few weeks in a classroom cares more about the drive to a grocery store and a gym than a fast run to the terminal on move-in day alone. A technician on a fixed shift who drives to MCO five or six days a week for a month cares about the airport number first and everything else second. The map and the chart above let you weigh both before you pick a home.

06A month working an airport schedule

An airline station runs on a schedule that does not look like a hospital's three shifts or an office's nine to five. Flight crews report for a trip, fly it, and come home whenever that trip ends, sometimes a late night arrival and sometimes a pre-dawn report the next morning. Maintenance technicians and ground staff often work a fixed shift built around a bank of flights, which can start before sunrise. Trainees and new hires usually keep more regular daytime hours during a training class, and project staff on a station rollout work whatever hours that project needs that week.

What these guests ask for tends to be the same short list. A quiet house, so a body on the wrong clock can actually sleep during the day. A bedroom that blocks daylight. Parking that is yours alone, so nobody has to move a car for a 4 a.m. departure. A kitchen, so a crew member coming off a red-eye can eat something at 7 a.m. without finding a restaurant open. Sharing a house also solves a cost problem specific to airline crews: three separate apartments near an airport mean three deposits and three leases, while three people sharing one furnished house split a single monthly rate.

A flight crew member relocating to the Orlando base for good, as opposed to passing through on a single trip, is moving house on a schedule set by the airline's own scheduling process, and that process can hand them short notice and little say over the exact date. The first month in a shared furnished home buys time to learn the base and the city and decide on a longer-term apartment or house near a specific route, without signing a year-long lease before any of that is settled. A monthly agreement with us covers exactly that window, and it extends by the month if the search runs longer than planned.

For a maintenance technician or a ground-staff transfer, the practical questions are usually about gear and hours: somewhere to keep equipment out of a hot car, a place to do laundry after a shift on the ramp, and a driveway that does not depend on street parking rules changing under you. A trainee in a multi-week class has a simpler set of needs closer to a short-term apartment: a bed, a kitchen, a desk if the coursework runs into the evening, and a fixed end date that matches the class calendar. Project staff on a station rollout sit in between, often for a defined stretch of weeks, with a small team sharing one house instead of a block of hotel rooms. The same monthly terms cover other Orlando employers too, and our corporate and business housing, relocation and long-stay and contractor and crew housing pages go through the details for those stays.

07The homes closest to MCO

Three of the homes are within about half an hour of the airport by road, in two neighborhoods on the west and south sides of the city.

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

West Orlando

Washington Shores

Game Day Getaway-Downtown Orlando

4 bd 2 ba Sleeps 13

7 min downtown · 7 min ORMC · 16 min Universal

Travel Nurse & MedicalInsurance & Displacement

West Orlando

Washington Shores / Lake Sunset

City and Stadium Sanctuary Vibes

3 bd 1 ba Sleeps 8

7 min downtown · 8 min ORMC · 15 min Universal

Game Days, Concerts & WeekendsTravel Nurse & Medical

The 25th Street House in Holden Heights is the closest, at about 26 minutes. It is a three-bedroom, two-bathroom bungalow that sleeps ten, with a full-size washer and dryer on site, keyless entry and fruit trees in the fenced backyard. It carries 142 Airbnb reviews at a 4.83 rating, the most of any home we have, and its bedrooms are compact, which suits one or two crew members well and a family of four adequately. The Dollins House in Washington Shores is about 29 minutes away: four bedrooms, two bathrooms, sleeping thirteen, with blackout curtains in the bedrooms and a shaded lot under mature oaks, a practical pick when two or three people on different shifts each need a dark room at a different hour. The Sunset Lake House, also in Washington Shores, is about 29 minutes as well: a small three-bedroom, one-bathroom bungalow under a live oak with a carport, sleeping up to eight, on the quieter end of the same neighborhood.

Behind those three, Amelia’s Arena Retreat is about 30 minutes away: a four-bedroom, two-bathroom home in Parramore with a fenced backyard and one bedroom that has its own attached bathroom, useful again for two people keeping different hours. Meet. Play. Stay. in Malibu Groves is about 31 minutes: the newest-built home in the portfolio, with desks in two of its three bedrooms and an attached garage, a better fit for a project team or a trainee who wants a quiet place to study than for a crew swapping shifts around the clock.

08Billing for airline crews and companies

An established employer, staffing agency or relocation coordinator can be the named party on the agreement, with one monthly invoice, itemized receipts, and a W-9 and a certificate of insurance on request. Net-30 terms are available to an established company, agency or insurer on a signed agreement or purchase order once the account is set up; the first booking is paid up front. If a crew member is booking personally and expensing the stay later, the same written agreement and itemized receipts work for a reimbursement, without any of the net-30 paperwork.

Extensions run month by month. If a training class, a rotation or a project runs longer than planned, tell us before the current month ends and we will hold the following month at the same home where we can. The same process applies for an individual's own booking and for one billed through an employer's accounts team.

Every stay, whichever party pays, runs on the same paperwork: a written agreement naming the home, the dates, the rate and the deposit, plus itemized monthly receipts. Libema carries a commercial landlord liability policy, which is what backs the certificate of insurance we provide on request. Guests let themselves in with keyless entry or a lockbox, and arrival notes with the code or the key location arrive a few days before check-in, so someone landing on an odd schedule is not waiting on anyone to hand over a key.

09The toll roads and the shift commute

SR-408 collects tolls, by transponder or by plate. If you are driving to MCO several times a week over a month or a training class, a SunPass or E-PASS transponder costs less per trip than paying by plate. SR-528 carries the final stretch into the terminal, and because flights arrive and depart around the clock, traffic on it does not follow the city's usual daytime rush hour the way SR-408 does closer to downtown.

Parking at the house is never the problem. Every home has its own driveway, carport or parking pad, so a technician coming off a night shift pulls straight in without hunting for street space, and a crew member leaving for an early report does not have to work around anyone else's car. Airport parking, badge access and any employee shuttle are Southwest's and the airport's to explain; ask your base or your supervisor what applies to you.

One local wrinkle is worth knowing if you land at City and Stadium Sanctuary Vibes: it sits close to Camping World Stadium, and the honesty notes on that home point out that event days bring extra stadium traffic to the immediate streets. It rarely changes the airport drive itself, since that route runs the opposite direction on SR-408, but it is worth building in a few extra minutes on a game night if your report time lands during one.

10What's in the house

Every home comes furnished and ready from the first night, the same way for an airline employee as for any other guest. The exact inclusions vary a little by home and are confirmed in writing when you book.

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

None of the homes has a pool; they are residential houses. Bed and bath counts are the counts in each home's own listing, and sofas are not counted as beds. Six homes publish a street address on the site, the 25th Street, Dollins, Amelia, Piedmont, Katherine and Head Avenue houses among them; for the other six we publish the neighborhood and zip code and share the exact address at booking.

Wi-Fi is on from day one, kitchens come stocked with cookware and dishes, and every bedroom is set up with a made-up bed rather than a mattress waiting for sheets. A pet, if you are relocating with one, is welcome at several of the homes once the policy and any deposit are confirmed in writing.

11What guests said

These are real reviews from Fruit Tree Home's own Airbnb listing, quoted verbatim with the reviewer's name and month. Every home page carries its own set, and the full wall of reviews across the portfolio is on our reviews page.

12Booking a house near MCO

Inquiries go to (954) 793-1171 or libemapropertiesllc@gmail.com, and we answer the same day. Tell us your report date, how many bedrooms you need, and whether you, an agency or the airline will be the party on the agreement, and we will confirm which of the thirteen homes are open for that window along with the rate, the deposit and the pet policy in writing before you commit.

A short assignment or a single training class can also run nightly or weekly through a home's own Airbnb or Vrbo listing instead of the monthly agreement, which suits a shorter class or a quick station visit better than a full month's paperwork. Either way, the house comes the same: furnished, stocked and ready before you land.

A single employee, a pair on the same rotation, or three or four colleagues sharing a house all book the same way: one written agreement for the whole house, at one rate, with everyone's name added to the guest list if that is how the group wants it set up.