Housing near Team Orlando (Military Simulation & Training)

04The drive from each of the thirteen homes

The Central Florida Research Park sits on the east side of the metro, while all thirteen of our homes sit on the west, northwest or downtown edges of Orlando, so every drive between them runs in the twenty-six to thirty-six minute range rather than single digits. Three homes tie at about 26 minutes: Game Day Getaway-Downtown Orlando, Fruit Tree Home and City and Stadium Sanctuary Vibes. Amelia’s Arena Retreat follows at 27 minutes, and Meet. Play. Stay. at 29.

The rest of the homes spread out from there. Entertainment Home and Cozy Home, both in Pine Hills, run about 30 minutes. Piedmont and The Clue House are about 31. WinterPark Home and Downtown & Stadium Cozy Retreat, toward Lockhart and Pine Hills, are about 33. Wekiwa Home, out in Hiawassee, is 36 minutes. These are road-routing figures without traffic, and Orlando's rush hours add to the longer routes.

For comparison, the same three homes tied at 26 minutes are a similar drive from Walt Disney World: about 37 minutes from Game Day Getaway-Downtown Orlando, 34 from Fruit Tree Home and 36 from City and Stadium Sanctuary Vibes. A stay set up for the Research Park works just as well for a day off at the parks, without moving to a different home.

05Where the homes sit against the Research Park

The map places each home in its true compass direction from the Research Park, with its distance from the centre showing the drive time by road rather than miles. The pattern echoes how the thirteen homes sit across Orlando generally: the Parramore and Holden Heights homes sit closest to the downtown edge, the Washington Shores and Malibu Groves cluster on the west side sits a little further out, the Pine Hills, Rosemont and Lockhart homes trail along a similar band to the northwest, and Wekiwa Home sits farthest out in Hiawassee.

SR-408 is the corridor most of these drives run on, and it is tolled by transponder or by plate. Over a multi-month assignment with regular trips to the park, a SunPass or E-PASS transponder set up in the first week is worth it; plate tolling works but costs more per trip. None of the thirteen homes is walkable to the Research Park, so plan on a car for the length of the stay.

The same SR-408 corridor that reaches the Research Park also runs past Camping World Stadium and downtown, so a household near the Dollins, 25th Street or Sunset Lake houses is not routing through a different part of the city to get to work than it would for an errand downtown. That matters over a stay of several months: the daily drive stays on roads you already know from grocery runs and weekend trips, rather than a route reserved only for the commute. It also means a spouse or roommate who is not working at the Research Park is not stranded; the same roads that carry the morning drive east also carry the trip to the grocery store, the stadium district or downtown.

06The homes closest to the Research Park

Three homes are about 26 minutes from the Research Park by road, and between them they cover a range of stays from a single traveler to a family joining a longer assignment.

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

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 / 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 Dollins House at 510 S Dollins Ave in Washington Shores is a four-bedroom, two-bathroom house that sleeps 13, on a shaded lot under mature oaks with a private driveway. The bedrooms have wall-mounted TVs and blackout curtains, which suits someone working a rotating schedule, and the kitchen has gray shaker cabinets, granite counters and marble-look tile that has already been renovated rather than original to the house. It is about 3 minutes from Camping World Stadium and 7 minutes from both downtown Orlando and Orlando Health.

The 25th Street House at 1010 25th St in Holden Heights is a three-bedroom, two-bathroom bungalow that sleeps 10, with full-size laundry on site, keyless entry and a screened front porch. It is a modest older bungalow with small bedrooms rather than a large house, and it carries 142 Airbnb reviews at a 4.83 rating, the deepest review history of the three. It is about 5 minutes from Orlando Health and 6 from downtown.

The Sunset Lake House, also in Washington Shores, publishes its neighborhood and zip code rather than a street address, with the exact address shared at booking. It is a small three-bedroom, one-bathroom bungalow under a live oak, with a carport and simple, practical furnishings; the one bathroom serves all three bedrooms, and the backyard is currently being refreshed and is for walking a pet rather than sitting out. It is about 2 minutes from Camping World Stadium, 7 from downtown and 8 from Orlando Health.

A company placing more than one person at once might want a bigger house than any of these three. Piedmont in Washington Shores sleeps 14 and is about 31 minutes from the Research Park, with a concrete parking pad that fits several vehicles. The Clue House in Pine Hills sleeps 15, is also about 31 minutes away, and has full-size laundry and a private driveway, which suits a small team sharing one house instead of splitting across several hotel rooms.

07A month of work near the Research Park

A full contract or a single program phase both need the same basic setup: a private house with its own kitchen and laundry, a written agreement covering the dates and the rate, and parking at the door instead of a hotel garage. Bedrooms come furnished and made up, kitchens come stocked with cookware and dishes, and Wi-Fi is on from the first night, so someone rotating in can start the work the next morning instead of setting up a household first. Extensions run month by month, which matters when a phase or a rotation runs longer than planned.

Not every trip runs for months. The I/ITSEC conference each winter draws a week of attendees to the Orange County Convention Center rather than a program-length stay, and the three homes closest to the Research Park also reach the convention center in a reasonable drive: about 21 minutes from Game Day Getaway-Downtown Orlando, 18 from Fruit Tree Home and 20 from City and Stadium Sanctuary Vibes. For a week like that, a nightly or weekly booking through the home's Airbnb or Vrbo listing works better than a monthly agreement.

Engineers and program staff rotating in for a single phase sit somewhere between those two patterns: long enough to want a full kitchen and laundry rather than a hotel room, short enough that the monthly agreement still needs to flex if the phase wraps earlier or later than planned. That is the same reason the agreement is written month by month rather than for a fixed term up front. A program-office staffer sent for a single test event, a review milestone or a training exercise fits the same pattern as an engineer on rotation: the house is booked for the phase that is known, and extended once the next phase is confirmed rather than guessed at in advance.

08Billing for orders, per diem and contractor teams

Service members and contractors on their own orders book the same way any traveler does: a written agreement naming the dates and the rate, plus itemized monthly receipts formatted for a housing stipend or a travel voucher. If your agency prefers to be the party on the agreement instead of you personally, we write it that way. The monthly rate, the deposit and the pet policy are all confirmed in writing before you commit, so the numbers your voucher needs are settled before the first night rather than worked out afterward.

When a company is placing a team near the Research Park rather than booking for one traveler, the agreement can be written to the company, with a monthly invoice in the company's name. Net-30 terms are available to established companies, agencies and insurers on a signed agreement or purchase order, with the first booking paid up front; a W-9 and a certificate of insurance are available on request. Our government and per-diem housing, contractor and work crew housing and corporate and business housing pages go further into each of those arrangements.

09Living near these homes for the length of a stay

Fruit Tree Home sits in Holden Heights, just south of downtown, and the Dollins and Sunset Lake houses sit in Washington Shores to the west. Both clusters are covered in our downtown and close-in area guide and our Washington Shores and west Orlando area guide. For groceries, the Publix on South Orange Avenue is close to Holden Heights, and the compact Publix at The Paramount on Lake Eola covers downtown; from the Washington Shores side, the Walmart Supercenter on West Princeton Street handles a bigger weekly shop.

Nikki's Place on South Orange Blossom Trail has served soul food since 1999, a few minutes from the Dollins and Sunset Lake houses. Lake Lorna Doone Park, a twelve-acre city park by Camping World Stadium, reopened in 2021 after an eight-million-dollar rebuild and now has a walking loop, outdoor fitness stations and a splash pad, close enough from City and Stadium Sanctuary Vibes to use on an evening off. Downtown, Lake Eola Park adds a roughly one-mile sidewalk loop, swan boats to rent, and a Sunday farmers market from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m.

The Downtown Orlando YMCA on North Mills Avenue, a full-service gym with two pools, is a few minutes from Fruit Tree Home. Pharmacies sit along Orange Blossom Trail and West Colonial for the Washington Shores homes, plus the Publix pharmacy at Lake Eola and CVS and Walgreens downtown for Holden Heights. Two SunRail stations, LYNX Central and Church Street, plus the free LYMMO bus, cover the downtown core if you want to leave the car parked on a day off, though the drive out to the Research Park itself still needs one.

10What's in the house

Every home comes furnished and ready from the first night: furniture, beds and linens, a stocked kitchen with cookware and dishes, a washer and dryer, Wi-Fi, and private parking in a driveway, carport or parking pad. Exact inclusions are confirmed in writing when you inquire.

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. Game Day Getaway-Downtown Orlando and Fruit Tree Home both publish a street address on the site; City and Stadium Sanctuary Vibes is one of the six homes that publish only a neighborhood and zip code, with the address shared once you book. Fruit Tree Home lists full-size laundry on site among its features; Game Day Getaway-Downtown Orlando and City and Stadium Sanctuary Vibes each have their own washer and dryer as well, so laundry stays in the house at any of the three.

11What guests said

These are real reviews from Game Day Getaway-Downtown Orlando'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 all thirteen homes is on our reviews page. Game Day Getaway-Downtown Orlando carries a 4.15 rating from 12 reviews; Fruit Tree Home, the other home tied at 26 minutes, carries a 4.83 rating from 142 reviews, and City and Stadium Sanctuary Vibes carries a 4.4 rating from 7. Each home's own page has its own set.

12A planning checklist before you book

A few things are worth settling before an assignment near the Research Park starts.

• Decide who the written agreement should name: you personally, your agency, or your company, since receipts follow whoever is named.
• If the assignment might stretch past the first block of months, say so early; extensions run month by month.
• Set up a SunPass or E-PASS before your first drive on SR-408 if you plan to use it often.
• Ask about the pet policy in writing before you commit if you are bringing a dog or cat; several of our homes accept pets.
• If your company needs a W-9 or a certificate of insurance before it can process payment, request them when you inquire so they are ready before the first invoice is due.
• If the trip is a single week rather than a full assignment, such as the I/ITSEC conference, ask about a nightly or weekly booking on the home's Airbnb or Vrbo listing instead of the monthly agreement.