A building Northeast Florida Builders Association purchased in January will be converted into its new offices and the home of its Workforce Education Center, the organization announced Feb. 10.
Built in 2004, the two-story, 43,024-square-foot building sits on 4.7 acres at 4932 Sunbeam Road. It is about 0.07 mile west of Philips Highway south of Baymeadows.
NEFBA bought it Jan. 21 for $3.9 million. The seller was Royal Oak Realty Trust of Rochester, New York, though Sunbeam Rd Jacksonville LLC.
Court records show NEFBA then took out a $3.69 million mortgage with Ameris Bank.
“This new facility represents a transformative opportunity for our Association to support the program and our apprentices, with a state-of-the-art facility while simultaneously expanding our program into additional workforce development areas,” 2025 NEFBA President Seth Kelley said in a news release.
The apprentice program started in 1973 and has trained thousands of workers in the electrical, HVAC, plumbing and carpentry fields. Currently, 460 people are in the four-year program.
“The goal will be to make it even larger than what we do currently with our apprenticeship program,” said Jessie Spradley, NEFBA executive officer.
The building is a former call center that NEFBA plans to renovate.
NEFBA is starting a Together We Build fundraising campaign to pay for the $1 million cost, Kelley said.
Besides offices, it will include construction labs, a dozen classrooms and a 300-seat auditorium.
The target completion date is spring 2026.
Originally, NEFBA was looking for a larger facility for the Workforce Education Center, Spradley said. Classes were being held in three locations.
When this property became available, it proved large enough to house the school and the headquarters.
“It was an old call center, which is great because it’s basically a blank slate. There are offices lining the outside of the building, but the interior is just wide open space. It was full of cubicles, right? So we’re really excited about it,” Spradley said.
The NEFBA offices are now in Southpoint in a 10,308-square-foot building about 5.2 miles north at 6747 Southpoint Parkway.
NEFBA built that headquarters, raising $1.9 million for the building and site preparation.
It moved into those offices in 2018.
The Southpoint property will be sold when NEFBA moves into the Sunbeam Road location.