Downtown St. Augustine Homes

St. Augustine was founded by Spain in 1565. The St. Augustine Town Plan Historic District, a National Historic Landmark since 1970, covers about 113 acres and preserves the colonial street grid inside the old city walls, including the Castillo de San Marcos, the Cathedral Basilica, and the González-Alvarez “Oldest House” (circa 1723). Roughly half the buildings in the district predate 1925. “Downtown” as buyers use the term is larger than that and takes in several distinct neighborhoods.

Colonial Quarter and the bayfront core. St. George Street, Aviles Street, the Plaza de la Constitución, and the Avenida Menendez bayfront are the dining and tourist heart of the city; the Colonial Quarter itself is a two-acre living history museum at 29 St. George Street. Housing is scarce and expensive: colonial and Victorian homes on small lots, condominiums, and residences above shops. Much of this core is zoned HP-1, which sharply limits rental use (see below).

Lincolnville. Founded in 1866 by freedmen on the west bank of Maria Sanchez Creek, Lincolnville is a 45-block National Register district (listed 1991) south and west of the Plaza, and was the organizing base for the 1964 civil rights demonstrations that brought Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. to the city. The housing is mostly late-19th and early-20th-century frame cottages and two-story homes on narrow lots, with a steady flow of restorations and new infill.

Flagler College and the Model Land Company district. West of Cordova Street, Henry Flagler’s 1888 Hotel Ponce de Leon (Flagler College since 1968) anchors the Model Land Company Historic District, a National Register district since 1983 with more than 200 contributing structures, bounded roughly by Ponce de Leon Boulevard, King, Cordova, and Orange streets. Homes here are larger Victorian and early-20th-century residences with more yard than the colonial core.

Uptown, San Marco Avenue, and Abbott Tract. North of the Castillo, San Marco Avenue is a corridor of antique shops, galleries, and restaurants, with the Fountain of Youth Archaeological Park and the Old Jail nearby. Abbott Tract, between San Marco and the bayfront, is a 17-block National Register district (1983) developed by Lucy Abbott from the 1860s, with about 124 contributing buildings. Nelmar Terrace, further north, is another National Register district that is quieter and generally less expensive than the bayfront blocks.

Davis Shores. Across the Bridge of Lions (opened 1927) on Anastasia Island, Davis Shores was laid out by developer D.P. Davis in 1925 as a 1,500-acre dredge-and-fill project. The 1926 land bust ended the original plan after only a handful of Mediterranean Revival homes were built, and most of the neighborhood filled in after World War II. Today it is a mix of mid-century ranch homes, canal and river waterfront, and rebuilt, elevated houses, a short walk or five-minute drive from the Plaza and about ten minutes from St. Augustine Beach.

• Historic single-family homes. Colonial, Victorian, Craftsman, and Mediterranean Revival houses from the 1700s through the 1930s. Lots are small, off-street parking is limited, and many homes have been renovated more than once.
• Carriage houses and accessory units. Common on historic lots and popular with buyers who want to live in one unit and rent the other. The second unit follows the same zoning rules as the main house.
• Condominiums and townhomes. Converted historic buildings near the Plaza plus newer projects on the edges of downtown and in Davis Shores. Condo documents can restrict rentals independently of city zoning.
• Mixed-use buildings. Retail or office below and living space above on St. George, King, Aviles, and San Marco, usually sold as investment property.
• Waterfront and canal homes. Mostly in Davis Shores and along the bayfront, some with private docks.

The city’s zoning code includes five Historic Preservation districts, HP-1 through HP-5, over the historic core and surrounding neighborhoods. Any project in an HP district, or facing HP-1, HP-2, or HP-3, is subject to Historic Architectural Review Board (HARB) review, and the specific HP district also determines whether a property can be rented short-term. Look up the parcel on the city’s online zoning map, or ask us to pull it, before you write an offer. Downtown pricing is driven less by square footage than by condition, zoning, parking, flood zone, and legal rental use.

Properties inside the city limits, which includes everything on this page, follow the City of St. Augustine’s short-term rental rules adopted in 2019 (Ordinances 2019-50, 2019-51, and 2019-52), not St. Johns County’s. The main points from the city’s Short-Term Rentals page:

• Zoning sets the minimum stay. In HP-1, which covers much of the colonial core, rentals must be one month or longer. In the RS-1 and RS-2 single-family districts, rentals must be one week or longer and nightly rentals are prohibited. In all other zoning districts, nightly rentals are permitted with an approved city registration. In practice, most nightly-rental opportunities are in HP-2, HP-3, and the commercial and mixed-use districts rather than the HP-1 bayfront blocks.
• Registration and inspection. Every short-term rental must be registered with the city and renewed annually, one registration per unit, with a fire life-safety inspection at registration and each year after. Fees are set by resolution and scale by bedroom count, from roughly $300 for a studio to roughly $650 to $700 for five or more bedrooms, plus a $100 late-renewal fee and $50 re-inspection fee. Confirm the current schedule on the city page.
• Occupancy and parking. Two persons per bedroom plus two additional children under 18, with a cap of 12; studios are limited to two. The city requires one on-site parking space per rental bedroom on an improved surface. Parking is the requirement that most often disqualifies an otherwise attractive historic property.
• Taxes and licensing. Rentals collect the 6% state sales tax and the 5% St. Johns County tourist development tax (about 11% combined). Platforms typically remit the state tax, but hosts should confirm how the county tax is handled and register with the St. Johns County Tax Collector. A Florida DBPR transient public lodging license generally applies as well.

City versus county. Unincorporated St. Johns County (most of Vilano Beach and Crescent Beach, for example) uses its own 2021 ordinance with a 10-person occupancy cap, one parking space per three occupants, and no HP-style minimum-stay districts; St. Augustine Beach is a third jurisdiction. If nightly rental income is central to your purchase, the first two questions for any downtown listing are “what is the zoning?” and “where will guests park?” We can pull both for any property you are considering.

The Historic Architectural Review Board (HARB) is the city board that reviews exterior changes in the HP districts. Per the city, it reviews Certificates and Opinions of Appropriateness, Certificates of Demolition or Relocation, local landmark designations, and historic preservation property tax exemption applications for both the city and St. Johns County. It meets at 1 p.m. on the third Thursday of each month at City Hall (75 King Street), and applications are due four weeks before the meeting.

• HARB review covers exterior work: additions, new construction, redevelopment, demolition, and relocation in HP districts or facing HP-1, HP-2, or HP-3. The city publishes design guidelines and paint color guidance. Interior work generally goes through the normal building permit process; confirm with the Planning and Building Department for your project.
• Projects on the Entry Corridors (Anastasia Boulevard, King Street, San Marco Avenue) go to a separate Corridor Review Committee instead.
• Budget for time. With a four-week lead time and monthly meetings, an exterior project can take months to clear review before permits issue. Build that into any renovate-and-rent plan.
• Ask about the historic property tax exemption before you start work. Both the city and county offer an ad valorem exemption for qualifying improvements to designated historic properties.
• Inspect carefully. Older wiring, plumbing, foundations, and termite history are common; wind mitigation and four-point reports are standard for insurance.

The reason people buy downtown, and the reason nightly rentals perform here, is that the district is walkable. From most of Lincolnville, the Model Land district, Abbott Tract, and north Davis Shores, the Plaza is a 10- to 20-minute walk, and within that radius are the Castillo de San Marcos, the Colonial Quarter, the Lightner Museum and Flagler College, the Cathedral Basilica, the distillery and winery near King Street and Riberia, the Amphitheatre on Anastasia Island, and the Nights of Lights display each winter. Dining runs from long-standing St. George Street restaurants to chef-driven spots on Aviles and Hypolita streets and San Marco Avenue, with breweries and casual places across the bridge on Anastasia Boulevard. Lincolnville has its own small commercial pocket around Bridge Street and M.L. King Avenue.

The trade-off is that the core is a working tourist district with foot traffic, carriages, trolleys, and holiday crowds. Buyers who want quiet usually look to Lincolnville’s interior streets, the Model Land blocks west of Cordova, Nelmar Terrace, or Davis Shores.

Parking. Many homes in the oldest blocks have little or no off-street parking. The city’s metered street and lot parking is $2.50 per hour, or $0.50 per hour for St. Johns County residents who register for the resident discount through the ParkStAug app, and the Historic Downtown Parking Facility is $20 per entry for the public or $3 with the resident discount. A driveway, garage, or deeded space is a real value item downtown, and for short-term rentals it is a legal requirement.

Flooding. This is the most important practical topic for a downtown buyer. The city’s own Coastal Vulnerability page states that a majority of the city lies in a flood plain, that some low-lying streets already see “sunny day” flooding at high tides, and that the city has been damaged by Hurricanes Matthew, Irma, Dorian, Ian, and Nicole as well as unnamed storms and king tides. Historically flood-prone areas include the Lake Maria Sanchez basin (parts of Lincolnville and the south end of downtown), portions of Davis Shores, and low blocks near the bayfront and San Sebastian River.

The city is investing heavily in mitigation. The Lake Maria Sanchez Flood Mitigation project, budgeted at about $30 million with roughly $20 million from a Resilient Florida grant, is adding a stormwater pump station, flood wall, tide check valves, and drainage upgrades to protect about 200 acres of the historic district, with construction phased through 2026. A separate tidal flooding mitigation program is underway in South Davis Shores, and the city is raising sewer pump stations in flood-prone areas. In 2025 the city announced it had moved from Class 7 to Class 4 in FEMA’s Community Rating System, which is expected to produce a 30% discount on NFIP flood insurance premiums for city policyholders effective April 1, 2026.

For a buyer, that means: check the FEMA flood zone and ask for an elevation certificate before making an offer; get flood, wind, and homeowners quotes early, since premiums vary widely between an elevated home and a slab home a block away; and ask for the seller’s flood disclosure. Higher ground in Abbott Tract and the Model Land district tends to carry lower risk, but the flood map is the authority, not the neighborhood name.

Downtown St. Augustine sits on the east side of St. Johns County between U.S. 1 and the Matanzas River, with the Bridge of Lions connecting to Anastasia Island and A1A. St. Augustine Beach is about 10 minutes across the bridge and Vilano Beach about 10 minutes north. I-95 is reached via State Road 16 or State Road 207 in roughly 10 to 15 minutes. Downtown Jacksonville is about 40 miles north, typically 45 minutes to an hour; Jacksonville International Airport is about 55 miles, usually 1 to 1.5 hours. Jacksonville’s Southside and the Mayo Clinic area are closer via U.S. 1 or I-95. Traffic on the core’s few access streets (King Street, San Marco Avenue, and the bridge approaches) backs up on weekends and during Nights of Lights, so daily commuters should test the drive at their actual departure time.