Lakers Sold Again for $12.5 Billion: Bob Iger and Josh Kushner Set Record With Historic Deal
The Los Angeles Lakers just got sold. Again. And this time the number is bigger than anything the sports world has ever seen.
On Wednesday, ESPN’s Ramona Shelburne and The Athletic’s Dan Woike reported that Mark Walter is selling the Lakers to an ownership group led by former Disney CEO Bob Iger and businessman Josh Kushner for a record-breaking $12.5 billion. That’s the most expensive U.S. sports team sale in history.
Walter only bought the team from the Buss family in June 2025 for $10 billion. Fourteen months later, he’s flipping the franchise for a $2.5 billion profit. That is one of the fastest, most lucrative real estate deals in sports history.
“As lifelong NBA fans, we are deeply honored for the opportunity to become stewards of the Los Angeles Lakers, one of the most iconic sports franchises in the world,” Iger and Kushner said in a joint statement. “We have immense respect for the leadership and vision of Jerry and Jeanie Buss. Our long-term commitment is to build on that foundation, compete at the highest level, and serve this extraordinary team, its fans, and the city of Los Angeles.”
For context on how insane $12.5 billion is: the Seattle Seahawks just sold this year for $9.6 billion after their Super Bowl run, and that was itself a record at the time. The Lakers just crushed that number by nearly $3 billion.
Iger is the former CEO of Disney and one of the most powerful media executives of the last 30 years. Kushner, brother of Jared Kushner, has previously owned a minority stake in the Memphis Grizzlies and currently holds a minority share in the Miami Heat. He also founded Thrive Capital, which has ties to FIFA president Gianni Infantino.
So this isn’t a random pair of billionaires stumbling into the Lakers. Both Iger and Kushner have serious NBA connections and understand what it takes to own an iconic sports property.
The Buss family had owned the Lakers since 1979, when Jerry Buss bought the franchise. That family run defined the Showtime era, the Shaq-Kobe threepeat, the Kobe-Pau title, and the Bubble championship with LeBron James. Now, in the span of just over a year, the team has changed hands twice.
Jeanie Buss is expected to remain as governor of the franchise. As part of the Walter deal in 2025, Buss was guaranteed a role through the turn of the decade, and Iger already confirmed his group intends to honor that agreement.
There’s also some context to Walter’s sudden decision to sell. He is currently under federal investigation for loan fraud, and offloading the Lakers for a massive profit gets him out of any potential complications tied to owning a marquee NBA franchise.
For fans, the immediate on-court impact is basically zero. Luka Doncic is still under contract. LeBron James is now in Philadelphia. The roster and coaching decisions are already in place for the 2026-27 season. New ownership takes months to gain approval from the NBA Board of Governors, so nothing is changing in November.
But long-term, this changes everything. The Lakers are now the most valuable franchise in North American sports history, and the new ownership is starting the clock on the next era of the purple and gold.
A longtime sports reporter, Carlos Garcia has written about some of the biggest and most notable athletic events of the last 5 years. He has been credentialed to cover MLS, NBA and MLB games all over the United States. His work has been published on Fox Sports, Bleacher Report, AOL and the Washington Post.
