The former Lawton Pratt funeral home is being converted into apartments. | Michelle Corum, Jacksonville Today
Published on August 21, 2025 at 10:35 am
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A century-old funeral home in LaVilla is getting new life as short-term rentals. And as historic makeovers go, the mortuary has been one big undertaking.
The 110-year old building at 525 W. Beaver Street in Jacksonville is being converted into 13 short-term apartment rentals, eight of them studio apartments, with kitchenettes and washer/dryers in each.
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The brick structure behind Old Stanton High School and a block over from Clara White Mission, once housed Lawton L. Pratt Undertaking Co. It operated as a mortuary right up until 2019.
Developer Eric Adler, founder and CEO of Silver Street Management, says he and other partners bought the property in 2021 for $650,000. Renovations and construction have taken $4 million.
In an interview Wednesday with host Anne Schindler on WJCT’s First Coast Connect, Adler — who has done smaller residential renovations in the area — jokingly calls this 10,000-square-foot conversion his first “big boy” adaptive reuse.
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Adler says the process hasn’t been easy. He thanks the Jacksonville Downtown Investment Authority for help and other crucial funding. The Jacksonville Historic Preservation Commission has recommended the building for the National Register of Historic Places, a designation that would offset some of the costs.
The building was designed and built by Joseph Haygood Blodgett (1858-1934), a Black self-taught architect and one of the richest men in Jacksonville at the time. Adler is keen on preserving historic elements.
For example, caskets were built on site. One apartment unit has an unused casket that has been repurposed as a kitchen island.
Other preserved items include an old safe, funeral home ledgers, brick walls, tile flooring, columns, chicken wire glass windows and a second floor lift used for caskets, “basically a dumbwaiter for caskets,” Adler says.
In his interview, Adler tells Schindler that people drawn to stay at these apartments will likely be those who like St. Augustine or Savannah ghost tours, fascinated by the ethereal and afterlife.
He describes what he classifies as tourism hospitality. “We’re trying to connect with folks who enjoy the supernatural, the macabre, folks who like to watch horror movies as our potential guests,” Adler says.
The metal gates will be preserved as the entrance to the restaurant he plans to add. They have built out the basement space, the original embalming area, and could turn it into a bar or speakeasy if things go as planned.
Rates for the smaller studios will be $150 to $250 and up to $250 to $350 per night for two-bedroom apartments.
Adler says they’re still working with JEA to get lines connected. They hope to be operating in a month or two — right around the time of Halloween.
