North Carolina-based Aventon Companies reportedly has the former Keiser University campus at 16120 US Highway 19 N in Largo under contract, with a preliminary site plan already submitted to the City of Largo. The proposal calls for 355 apartments spread across five five-story buildings on the 12-acre site — a conversion that would retire a 192,099-square-foot building constructed in 1985 that Keiser has occupied since 2014.
The site plan as submitted includes a resort-style pool, a clubhouse, two stormwater ponds, and 556 parking spaces, with roughly 40% of the property designated as open space. That parking ratio — 556 spaces for 355 units — reflects the suburban demand patterns of the US 19 corridor rather than the reduced-parking underwriting common in downtown Pinellas proposals.
The property changed hands in 2023 for $14.1 million. Keiser University is currently contesting its lease termination in court, which means the redevelopment cannot advance on its current timeline until that dispute resolves. The city's site plan review is, for now, preliminary — contingent on the legal outcome as much as any zoning consideration.
A neighborhood meeting is scheduled at Largo City Hall on July 29, the first formal public checkpoint before the plan moves further through the approval process.
The site's consolidated footprint gives the project its underlying logic. A 12-acre parcel along an infill corridor in Pinellas County is increasingly difficult to assemble from scratch, which makes aging institutional properties — particularly those with buildings approaching 40 years old — natural redevelopment targets. The 1985 structure's size, nearly 200,000 square feet, also adds complexity: repurposing a building of that configuration for multifamily use is typically less economical than a ground-up replacement.
The July 29 meeting at Largo City Hall will give neighbors their first look at the proposed massing and site layout. Beyond that, the pace of the Keiser lease litigation is the principal variable — until it resolves, Aventon's timeline remains open, and the project stays in the pipeline rather than on the construction calendar.
