Published on June 11, 2026 at 5:22 pm
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In a new round of bids, Duval Schools received offers from three companies for its headquarters building on Prudential Drive, records show.
A central Florida real estate firm, Bainbridge Communities, offered $15.5 million for the district’s entire Southbank site, according to records the district provided to Jacksonville Today after a public records request.
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Ashco, a local firm, offered as much as $17.5 million.
For several reasons, the third offer appears to potentially not be a legitimate offer.
Officials have not yet said which offer, if any, they will select, and the district also has not said where it would move its offices upon selling its current headquarters building.
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A board workshop scheduled next week will include a “real estate update.”
Headquarters history
Duval Schools has been actively working to sell the building with the help of Trinity Commercial Group for about a year. The board has voted twice in the last year on proposed contracts to sell the building.
It rejected the first proposal, from retirement community developer Fleet Landing, in October. Though Fleet Landing offered $20 million, the payment structure would have split it into two payments three years apart and effectively put the district in a position of carrying a $7.5 million loan for Fleet.
Board members accepted an offer of $17.2 million from Chase Properties the following month, but that deal fell through in March.
The deal collapsed when Chase said the district hadn’t disclosed the extent of a community development district bond debt that must be repaid. The nearly 5 acres of headquarters property is split between two parcels: a larger piece that includes the building and a smaller one that is a parking lot.
The parking lot piece is the part of the land subject to the CDD and the focus of continued controversy. Years ago, Elements Development, which is backed by Preston Hollow Capital, created a CDD called The District to help finance its RiversEdge project near Duval Schools’ headquarters. Duval Schools later acquired the parking lot — built by The District CDD — through a land swap.
Though Duval Schools doesn’t have to make payments toward the CDD bond because it’s a government entity, a new owner would likely become responsible to repay the bond.
It’s not clear exactly how much debt remains, but sources close to the project estimate it’s likely $6 million to $8 million.
The offers
Bainbridge is an Orlando-area real estate development firm with communities already built along the First Coast in Jacksonville, Ponte Vedra and Saint Augustine. It offered $15.5 million for the six-story building and all of the surrounding land, including the parking lot.
Bainbridge’s offer leaves the district an open-ended period of time to vacate the building. It sets the closing at 30 days after the city gives its approval to Bainbridge’s planned five-story luxury apartment building project.
Jacksonville-based Ashco, submitted two versions of its offer: $9 million for the parcel with the building only or up to $17.5 million for both parcels.
In the latter version, Ashco offers to buy the parcel with the building outright and prepay a 100-year lease for the parking lot piece for a total of $16.5 million. The company reserves the right to later pay an additional $1 million to purchase the smaller parcel.
Ashco didn’t say how it intended to use the property.
The final offer came from a local entrepreneur, Ade Ogunjobi, who has a standing federal injunction against him for securities fraud after the Securities and Exchange Commission sued him in 2003. He suggested a purchase price of $20 million or more but asked the district to sign over its headquarters first, promising payment later from the proceeds of a planned $100 billion bond offering he said would be backed by future gift-card sales.
Court records show he proposed a similar scheme to fund the Jaguars stadium a few years ago, though based on T-shirt sales instead of gift cards — and filed a suit against the city, Donna Deegan, Shad Khan, Nordstrom and several others, alleging discrimination, bribery and more, when the city did not accept his proposal.
