Florida has long held a distinctive allure for the wealthy, and for good reason. It provides a unique combination of inoffensive state tax rates, economic robustness, high-quality amenities and attractions, and the promise of a laid-back lifestyle replete with year-round sand and sun.
With just a 6% tax on sales, 5.5% corporate income tax, and no income tax at all for individuals, it is one of the best states in the country for conserving your capital, even if its historically low cost of living has been creeping upward (1) in the 2020s.
A key contributor to that creep — and testimony to the locale’s draw — is the recent migration of some of the nation’s best, brightest and, yes, richest entrepreneurs and executives, predominantly from states considered somewhat business-antagonistic (2), such as California (3) and New York.
The fresh arrival of all of these big names and the billions they’re toting with them has stimulated a development boom, especially around areas like West Palm Beach (4). It’s not just luxe office towers and residential communities that are popping up, either, but something else that has proven a key requirement for these new citizens of the sunshine state: private schools.
Florida’s private schools have been receiving an unmanageable inundation of applicants over the last few years, in part due to the rapid spike in population (5), but also because of a major expansion of the state’s school voucher program in 2023 (6).
Waitlists for the top elementary and secondary institutions are now the longest they’ve ever been (7). But, to keep up with demand, hundreds of new private schools have opened their doors (8) since the 2020-2021 academic year, many of which have been founded by the most affluent parents of prospective students.
Because amid fiercer-than-ever competition (9), why pester your board member connections or wait years for a spot at an academy when you can just build your own?
That’s exactly what AirWatch co-founder John Marshall did with his project, BaseCamp305 (10), which debuted for Pre-K to Grade 3 students in the early 2020s, and is already expanding with a middle school that will start accepting students in 2026.
There’s also the eponymous Greene School (11), courtesy of real estate developer Jeff Green;. SOLFL (12) from former WeWork executives Rebekah and Adam Neumann, who moved to Florida (13) post-COVID; and Wingrove Academy (14), among others, by Stephen Ross, a real estate mogul who seems to have made West Palm Beach his primary project (15).
As Marshall told (16) The Wall Street Journal (17) about his venture earlier in April, “This is how private schools have historically been founded — by families looking to fulfill a need, and then expanding over time.”
Some of those billionaires who aren’t building new schools are at least funding the growth of existing ones: $18 million from Tiger Global Management partner Scott Shleifer here (18), $50 million from fellow hedge fund manager Ken Griffin there (19).
And, of course, these institutions are providing the education and environment that these types of families demand, with a focus on highly individualized and alternative programming, small class sizes, leadership- and character- building philosophies, and top-tier facilities (think flight simulators and sailboats).
It’s a win-win for the parents and the state, which is adding a family-friendly edge to its reputation as a “billionaire’s playground” and “the Hamptons of the South.” The flurry of new developments will surely only serve to elevate the state’s appeal among an ultra-wealthy demographic that already has more than enough reasons to relocate there.
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News4Jax (1); YouTube (2); Fortune (3); Forbes (4); WUSF (5); Florida Timeline (6); Business Development Board of Palm Beach County (7); Florida Department of Education (8); Town & Country (9); BaseCamp305 (10); The Greene School (11); Axios (12); Fox Business (13); Wingrove Academy (14); The Wall Street Journal (15),(16),(17); Amicon (18); Griffin Catalyst (19)
This article originally appeared on Moneywise.com under the title: Tired of waitlists, Florida’s billionaires are spending millions to build their own elite private schools
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