George Lucas is still making money from Star Wars 14 years after selling Lucasfilm - as Disney's landlord When Disney bought Lucasfilm, they forgot to buy their office space, which George Lucas still owns, and collects rent for

The popverse ^ | June 16th, 2026 | Joshua Lapin-Bertone

[Cronos]

Mickey Mouse has quite an interesting landlord.

In 2012 Disney purchased Lucasfilm from George Lucas for $4.05 billion. However, you might be surprised to learn that Lucas is still getting money from Disney, thanks to some of his property holdings. You see, Disney may have bought George’s company, but they didn’t buy the offices the company was based in.

Skywalker Ranch is a production facility located in Nicasio, California. The movie ranch was purchased by George Lucas in 1978, and he still owns the property today. Skywalker Sound, Lucasfilm’s sound editing company, has been based at Skywalker Ranch for decades, and Disney hasn’t seen the need to move their office space.

According to Matthew Wood, a Skywalker Sound editor who voices General Grievous, this means George Lucas is still getting a check from Disney every month. “After the success of the original Star Wars films and American Graffiti and whatnot, [George Lucas] built out this beautiful location in Northern California,” Matthew Wood revealed during a panel at Spacecon 2026. “It’s about 40 minutes north of San Francisco. It’s out in nature right before you get to wine country up there. And he made this wonderful place work, wonderful place to create art, and he’s donated 90 percent of the land that he purchased to an open space moratorium. It’s open space and can never be developed on.”

Wood continued, “And now, funnily enough, since the intellectual property of Star Wars is owned by Disney, I work for Disney now - but we work at Skywalker Ranch, and we pay George Lucas. He’s our landlord, because all the rents and the physical properties are his. And he loves having us there. He’s a filmmaker at heart, so having us working at his location I think feels good to him.”

I wonder what kind of a landlord George is. Getting $4.05 billion from Disney is impressive but getting them to continue paying you every month is a power move worthy of Palpatine himself. Well done George, I wasn’t aware of your game.

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[Liz]

In the 1990s, the county assessed Lucas’ Skywalker Ranch at $84 million, though they eventually settled on a property value of $52 million. Developing the ranch cost an estimated $100 million and Lucas has a vast portfolio of properties that generate income.

While exact rent figures remain private, these lease agreements function as an “ongoing revenue stream” for the Star Wars creator. George Lucas is still making money from Star Wars 14 years after selling Lucasfilm ....... as Disney’s landlord.

[Nateman]

Disney has killed the franchise. At least when George sold out it did not come cheap to Disney.

[KC_Conspirator]

Its a disgrace what Disney is doing to Star Wars and other IPs.

[No name given]

Especially Marvel.

[NFHale]

4 billion bucks…

How nice it would be to have that kind of money just once… Just for one day. Never have to worry about the bills being paid, keeping the lights on, keeping the heating and AC running… Food on the table…

Can’t even conceive of having that much…