Mill Creek North Townhomes. Know what matters before you buy.

The 60-Second Overview

Mill Creek North Townhomes is the close-in leg of Lennar's current Duval County townhome rollout: brand-new 3-bedroom, 2.5-bath townhomes of about 1,716-1,717 square feet, listed roughly $294,990-$314,990, with a second-floor loft, covered lanai, Everything's Included finishes, and no CDD per current listings. The address is 1665 Garden Grove Court in Arlington, ZIP 32211, off the Mill Creek Road/Regency corridor, and downtown Jacksonville is roughly 7-8 miles and 10-15 minutes up the Arlington Expressway.

Two published plans carry the community, the Irving - Interior (~1,717 sq ft, from $294,990) and the Easton (~1,716 sq ft, from $314,990), and Lennar is no stranger to this exact spot: it started the Mill Creek North single-family neighborhood on land near Regency Square Mall back in 2017, and the townhomes extend that footprint. There is no clubhouse or pool; the amenity argument is geographic, and at this address it is a real one.

The story that makes this community more interesting than its spec sheet sits a mile away: the former Regency Square Mall sold in April 2025 and is being redeveloped as the 77-acre mixed-use Nexus at Regency, with demolition and site work underway through 2025-2026. If it delivers, the daily-life radius of this address improves materially. And the honesty that has to ride alongside it: this is Arlington as it is today, an established 1950s-70s part of town with modest school ratings and block-by-block character. You are buying the present with an option on the future, and we price both halves before you sign.

New-build pricing inside the close-in ring is the headline. The Regency redevelopment is the option. Arlington today is the homework.

Fees, No CDD, and the Monthly Math

Start with what is absent: no CDD, per current listings. Most new construction across Duval and St. Johns counties carries a community development district assessment on the tax bill, often hundreds to a couple thousand dollars a year, and buyers comparing this community against the big master-planned alternatives should put that line item on the spreadsheet explicitly, then verify the absence of any CDD or special assessment in the closing documents rather than taking a listing site's word for it.

What is present: an HOA for the townhome association. Third-party listing sites have reported a figure around $237 per month covering exterior grounds, and we deliberately treat that as a reported number, not a fact, builder-community HOA budgets get set and reset in the early years, and the only figure that matters is the one in the current association documents. The questions we put in writing: the exact current monthly amount, exactly what it covers (lawn, exterior maintenance, roof reserves or not), and how the reserve is funded while the builder still controls the board.

Then the rest of the stack: standard Duval millage on a roughly $300K assessed base, attached-product insurance (quote it before contract, not after), and whatever rate buydown Lennar is running that week. Assembled honestly, the all-in monthly payment lands close to what comparable 3-bedroom rentals run in the close-in ring, with quartz counters and a warranty instead of a landlord. That comparison, not the list price, is the real product being sold here.

The Regency Bet: the Nexus Next Door

No honest guide to this community can skip the mall. Regency Square Mall, a mile away, was the retail heart of Arlington for decades and spent its last years as a case study in mall decline. That chapter formally ended in 2025: Blackwater Development bought the bulk of the 77-acre property in April 2025 for roughly $19 million, the interior mall closed for good that June, and the project was rebranded the Nexus at Regency, a mixed-use redevelopment planned around multifamily housing, retail outparcels, and community space. Demolition permits and site-clearing work moved through 2025 and into 2026, with the first phase focused on the front acreage along Atlantic Boulevard and Monument Road.

Here is how we frame it for buyers, and we are deliberate about the framing: treat the Nexus as an option, not a promise. Large-scale mall redevelopments take years, phase plans change, and the gap between site clearing and a finished district is where optimistic underwriting goes to die. The base case for buying here has to work on Arlington as it exists today, a dated but functional retail corridor with everyday errands covered. If that math works for you, the Nexus is genuine upside: a delivered mixed-use district a mile from your front door would re-rate the entire corridor, and brand-new townhomes would be among the closest beneficiaries.

It is also worth saying that Lennar's presence here is not a coincidence. The builder has worked this exact pocket since 2017, when it announced the Mill Creek North single-family neighborhood on land near the mall, and adding a townhome product now, while the redevelopment money arrives next door, is a readable bet on the corridor. Builders are not always right, but they are rarely random. We track the Nexus permit activity and phase progress as part of representing buyers here, because the redevelopment timeline belongs in your resale model, not just the brochure.

Arlington, Honestly

Now the other half of the location sentence. Arlington is established, working Jacksonville east of the St. Johns: largely 1950s-to-1970s neighborhoods, anchored by Jacksonville University to the north, the Regency retail corridor at its center, and the Arlington Expressway running straight to downtown. By new-construction standards the geography is excellent, almost nothing new gets built this close to the core, and a new-townhome address 10-15 minutes from downtown, 15 from the Town Center, and 20-25 from the beaches is genuinely rare at this price.

And the address itself deserves the fuller sentence the renderings skip: this is a block-by-block part of town. Some Arlington streets are tidy, settled, and quietly improving; some are tired; the big corridors, Atlantic Boulevard, the Arlington Expressway frontage, Merrill Road, are busy and unpolished. School ratings across the zone are modest. None of that is disqualifying at this price, and the resale market reflects it honestly: Greater Arlington's median has hovered around $319K, roughly flat year over year, which is exactly the band these townhomes price into brand new.

Our standing advice, the same one we give in every transitional corridor: drive the approach streets twice, once in daylight and once after dark. Walk the stretch of Atlantic Boulevard you would actually use for errands. Check the crime map for the specific blocks, not the ZIP average, because 32211 averages together very different streets. Buyers who do that homework and still like the math, and many do, tend to be happy here. Buyers who skip it are the ones who get surprised, and surprise is the one thing we refuse to sell.

The Homes: Irving and Easton

The product line is simple and a notch larger than Lennar's entry-level Duval townhomes: the Irving - Interior runs about 1,717 square feet and the Easton about 1,716, both two-story townhomes with 3 bedrooms, 2.5 baths, an owner suite with en-suite bath and walk-in closet, a second-floor loft, and a covered lanai. Published pricing at the time of writing ran from $294,990 (Irving) to $314,990 (Easton), with specific homesites listing from the high $290Ks to the low $320Ks. Third-party sites also reference a ~1,707 sq ft Lincoln plan; confirm the live lineup with Lennar, because builder plan menus shift.

Everything's Included does the finish work: quartz countertops in kitchens and baths, upgraded stainless appliances, hard-surface flooring in the main living areas, and the smart-home package, no design-center options treadmill. With finishes fixed, what differentiates one purchase from another is position: end units versus interior units, what the homesite backs to, driveway length, and distance from the entrance and parking clusters. In a young community those differences carry straight into resale; tour the actual homesite, not the model, and walk the lot lines before you pick. And confirm the exact garage and guest-parking configuration per homesite, attached-product parking rules are a classic post-closing surprise.

Schools: Verify Everything

The community sits in Duval County Public Schools. Lennar's page lists Merrill Road Elementary, Arlington Middle, and Terry Parker High as zoned, and, to its credit, flags the list as computer-generated. Take the flag seriously, and take the ratings seriously too: Arlington-area schools carry modest scores overall, and Terry Parker, while it offers magnet programming including IB and AP coursework, rates below the state average on test-based measures. If schools drive your decision, confirm the current assignment for the specific address with the district directly, look at the GreatSchools and state data yourself, and ask about Duval's magnet and school-choice options rather than assuming the default zone is the only path.

What Living Here Is Actually Like

Practical, low-maintenance, location-first living: a new lock-and-leave townhome with a loft for the office or playroom, errands on the Atlantic Boulevard and Merrill Road corridors, the St. Johns River minutes west, and the whole city within easy reach, downtown in 10-15, the Town Center in about 15, the beaches in 20-25. The community itself is residential streets and driveways, not a programmed lifestyle; your social life happens in the city around it, which from this address is most of Jacksonville.

Five Costly Mistakes Buyers Make Here

Builder purchases in transitional corridors fail in predictable ways:

Homesites and Premiums

Relative price-and-position pressure across the current lineup, anchored to the ~$295K-$320K published range, not exact prices.

The Buyer Checklist

• Drive the corridor twice, daylight and after dark, before you sign.
• Register your own agent with Lennar on the first visit, before touring.
• Pull the live pricing and incentive sheet, it changes weekly.
• Price Lennar Mortgage against an outside lender on total cost, not rate alone.
• Confirm the HOA amount and coverage in the association documents, not a listing site.
• Verify no CDD or special assessment in the closing documents and confirm school zoning with the district.
• Order independent inspections: pre-drywall if possible, pre-closing always, 11-month later.
• Put the Nexus timeline in your model: buy on today, treat the redevelopment as upside.

Mill Creek North vs. the Alternatives

At this budget the realistic set is Lennar's own Duval rollout, Arlington itself, and the close-in alternatives:

The lane here is specific: the largest plans and the closest-in geography in Lennar's current Duval townhome lineup, with a funded redevelopment story next door. The Westside siblings are cheaper; the resales buy land and a project list; nothing else in the rollout pairs new-build pricing with this particular bet.

The Honest Pros and Cons

Our Buyer Playbook

How we run a Mill Creek North purchase, in order:

• Corridor first: the day-and-night drive and the block-level crime map before any tour.
• Register representation, then pull the live pricing and incentive sheet.
• Run the financing bake-off: Lennar Mortgage with incentives versus outside lenders, on total cost.
• Pick position deliberately: end units and backdrops over interior-facing-parking, every time the math allows.
• Model the Nexus honestly: base case on Arlington today, upside case on the delivered redevelopment, and inspect like a resale at every stage.

Questions We Ask Before You Offer

Six answers we get in writing on every contract here:

• What is the current incentive package, and what does it require (lender, title, close date)?
• What is the exact HOA amount today, what does it cover, and how are reserves funded?
• Is there any CDD or special assessment anywhere in the closing documents?
• What is the build/delivery timeline for this homesite, and what happens if it slips?
• What are the warranty terms, workmanship, systems, structural, and the claims process?
• What is the current school assignment for this address, confirmed with Duval County?

Is It Not For You?

The honest cut, both directions: