He paid $2 billion for the Clippers. He spent about $2 billion on their new arena. He bought the Forum for $400 million. Then I found a $22 million buy next door.
Steve Ballmer has already put more than $4 billion on Los Angeles.
In June 2025, a Clippers company paid $22 million for 3800 W. Century Boulevard in Inglewood.
The building on my file is 38,368 feet.
That is about $573 a foot on the building.
It sits right next to the Intuit Dome.
4 things to know
Steve Ballmer paid $2 billion for the Clippers in 2014.
He paid about $2 billion of his own money for the Intuit Dome.
He paid $400 million cash for the Forum.
In 2025 the Clippers bought 2.55 acres next to the arena for $22 million.
The Clippers were the first bet
Ballmer bought the Clippers in 2014 for $2 billion.
The Clippers needed their own home.
"It was clear to me, we had to have our own home, our own identity," Ballmer said later.
That is how he ended up in Inglewood.
The $2 billion arena
The Intuit Dome opened in August 2024.
Reports say Ballmer spent more than $2 billion of his own money.
It became one of the most expensive basketball buildings ever.
The project sits on about 28 acres. It has a 915,000-foot arena.
An 85,000-foot practice gym.
Offices.
Medical space.
Shops.
Food. And a big outdoor plaza.
The Clippers built a home, a practice gym, a show building, and a place for people to gather.
Madison Square Garden owned the Forum nearby and was fighting the new building.
A new arena could take concerts and big shows from the Forum.
Ballmer's answer was simple.
He bought the Forum.
$400 million. Cash.
That ended a big fight.
By then he had already spent more on Inglewood than the $2 billion he paid for the team.
Public records suggest he was not done.
Why pay $22 million for an old warehouse?
3800 W. Century Boulevard was built in 1989 on my file.
My file has 38,368 feet of building on about 110,965 feet of land.
If I price the building, that is about $573 a foot.
The lot is about 2.55 acres. At $22 million, that is about $198 a foot of dirt.
Now it looks less like a warehouse buy and more like a land buy.
The site is next to the Intuit Dome.
I do not think the Clippers paid $22 million because they wanted to own a warehouse.
They wanted the spot.
The arena is the hook
This is the part of sports.
The team brings the fans.
The arena brings the shows.
The land around it catches what comes next. Parking. Food. Hotels. Ads. Concerts. Fan space. Later buildings.
Stan Kroenke did this a few miles away.
SoFi Stadium is the center of Hollywood Park.
The rest of the plan covers almost 300 acres. Offices. Apartments. Shops.
A hotel. Parks. Shows.
Kroenke did not only build a football stadium.
He used the stadium to hold a new neighborhood.
Ballmer's project is smaller. I see the same idea. Build something people cannot copy. Own the land around it. Give millions of visitors a reason to stay and spend.
The bet may already be working
Ballmer paid $2 billion for the Clippers in 2014.
Forbes now puts the team at about $7.5 billion.
There are only 30 NBA teams. There is only one Los Angeles. And there was a chance to give the second basketball team a real home.
What an operator sees
I keep coming back to the $22 million warehouse because it shows the difference between the price of a building and the value of control.
At $573 a building foot, the deal looks hard to explain. Its WAY TOO Much for this area.
At $198 a land foot next to a new $2 billion arena, it looks like he needed it and paid extra to get it.
He does not need warehouse rent to make the buy work. The site can help with events, parking, security or anything they need.
Ballmer's Los Angeles bet now includes:
A $2 billion basketball team
A about $2 billion arena campus
A $400 million show building
And more land in the right spots
Steve is building a home for the Clippers. And he is taking control of the land around it.
The next part of the story will get interesting as we see if it lowers vacancies in the area and boosts rents up.
I'm researching the market to make better investment strategies. I'm sharing what I find along the way with other investors to have discussions, debates and help make better decisions.
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