I just said, “All right, I’ll be back.” So then the American Express security called me and he, “Hey man, somebody stole your credit card and they spent 70,000 at Walmart.” Shaquille O’Neal steps out onto the tarmac, the sun bouncing off a sleek white jet with a giant Dunk Man logo on the tail.

It’s a Bombardier Challenger 650, a private jet that costs around $27 million built to carry a dozen people in cream leather and polished wood. A few years ago, Shaq used to joke he’d never buy his own jet. Now, in 2025, it’s just another way he gets from his homes to his businesses to the TV studios that help keep his $500 million empire rolling.

But to really understand how he lives now, you have to go back to the house that turned him into a real estate legend. For nearly three decades, Shaq’s most famous address sat on the edge of Lake Butler and an ultra exclusive Orlando community. From the street, it looked like a resort. Massive gates, tall white columns, balconies everywhere, and a driveway big enough to park a car dealership.

Inside, it was even more over the top. A 35,000 plus square ft mansion, 12 bedrooms, 15 bathrooms, a 95 ft resortstyle pool, a 6,000 ft indoor basketball court, and a garage that could swallow 17 cars. Superman logos were hidden everywhere, etched into glass, stitched into furniture glowing on the wall of his custom theater.

He bought it for about $3.95 million in 1993. By the time he tried to sell it, he was asking $28 million. The home sat on the market for years with price cuts and relistings until he finally sold it in 2021 for around $11 million. still a multi-million profit, but also a sign that Shaq was ready to turn the page on his most famous Superman house.

So, if Casa Diesel is in someone else’s hands now, where does Shaq actually live? These days, Shaq’s main base isn’t in Florida. It’s in Georgia on a quiet stretch of land about 30 mi outside Atlanta. Back in 2016, he bought a 14.3 acre compound in Mcdana for just over $1.15 million. On paper, it sounds almost modest compared to the Orlando mega mansion, but in reality, it’s still huge.

Two separate houses with a combined 7 to 8,000 square feet, multiple bedrooms and bathrooms, a big pool and hot tub between them, and a private home theater where he can watch games in peace. Over time, he’s quietly added more properties in the area, turning parts of Mcdana into a mini shack village. Reports in 2024 describe at least four homes tied to him in that region alone.

It’s not as loud as the old Superman house, but it fits the version of Shaq, who spends most of his time working in Atlanta TV studios, dropping in on franchise locations, and flying out on that private jet when business calls. And that jet is the clearest sign of how his lifestyle has leveled up by 2025. For years, Shaq rented planes and swore owning one didn’t make sense.

Then in 2023, he changed his mind and bought the Challenger 650 outright for around $27 million. The plane is large enough for a small team with long range capability and a fully customized interior. The Dunkman logo is painted on the tail and wing tips so that even from the runway, there’s no doubt who’s arriving. A jet like that only makes sense if the money behind it is very real.

So, how big is Shack’s world in 2025? Most estimates now put Shaquille O’Neal’s net worth at roughly $500 million. During his NBA career, he earned around 286 to 292 million just from salary. Then you stack hundreds of millions more from endorsements. That alone would be enough for a comfortable life. But Shaq didn’t stop there.

He turned himself into a walking conglomerate. Over the years, he’s owned or invested in a massive franchise portfolio. At one point, reports say he had stakes in around 155 Guys restaurants, 17 Auntie Anan’s locations, roughly 150 car washes, 40 fitness centers, plus deals with Papa John’s, Crispy Cream, and other big chains.

Some of those numbers have shifted as he’s bought, sold, and rebalanced. But the pattern is clear. Shaq likes steady, boring cash flow. Recently, he’s talked about how much he loves Crispy Cream in particular, not just as an investor, but simply because he likes donuts. On top of all that, he has equity in brands and companies outside food, early investment in Google, involvement with Ring before Amazon bought it, real estate holdings, and brand deals with everything from betting companies to car insurance.

Add a reported multi-million annual salary from inside the NBA and other media work, and the picture makes sense. A half billion dollar net worth is not a stretch. It’s almost conservative. And when you have that much coming in, the toys level up, too. Shaq’s car collection has always looked like a kid got to design a billionaire’s garage.

Because of his size, most regular sports cars don’t fit him, so he either stretches them or buy something outrageous. He’s owned a Ford F-650 super truck that looks like a lifted building, multiple Rolls-Royce models, including a Phantom, and eye-catching custom builds like the Vader, a kit-based supercar styled like something out of a comic book.

He’s also big on the Vanderhal Venice, a three- wheeled roadster that he had modified so his 7 foot1 frame could actually sit comfortably. More recently, he went even more futuristic with a Lucid Air that West Coast Customs re-engineered just for him. The shop pushed back the pillars, turned the car into an extended two-door so he could slide in easily, and even replace the front badge with his diesel nickname and custom Superman style touches on the rims.

The base model of the Lucid can already cost up to around a quart of a million dollars, but after the custom work, his version is a true one of one. You can see a pattern in how he spins. big, bold, but very on brand. Which brings us back to how he actually lives day-to-day in 2025. At ground level, a lot of Shaq’s life still revolves around TV.

He’s a central face of TNT/ inside the NBA, where his joking arguments, pranks, and debates with the crew keep him on screen all season long. Behind the scenes, he’s moved into more suit and tie roles, too. In 2023, Reebok named him president of basketball with Alan Iverson as his vice president.

Together, they’re leading the brand’s return to relevance, a story that’s big enough to get its own Netflix docu series. He still does brand deals, still shows up in commercials, and still leans into the funny, approachable version of himself that fans fell in love with. But underneath that is a guy who quietly checks on his franchises, flies between cities on his own jet, and spends a lot of time at home in Georgia walking those 14 acres instead of just pacing the baseline.

The interesting thing is that his lifestyle, as big as it looks, is built on a surprisingly simple rule. Shaq has said his investing mindset changed when he heard Jeff Bezos explain a basic strategy. Only put your money into something you truly understand and believe in. If he doesn’t believe in it, he doesn’t even look at it.

That’s why so many of his plays are straightforward. Burgers, donuts, gym, shoes, media, things regular people actually use. And when you line it all up, his 2025 lifestyle makes sense. He used to show off a Superman logo on every wall of his Orlando mansion. Now that house is gone, and the Superman logos have moved on to car rims, sneakers, and the tail of a jet.

He went from one giant home with a 95 ft pool to a spread out property empire that lets him live closer to his work, his business interests, and his family. He traded one legendary address for a whole portfolio of them. In the end, Shaquille O’Neal’s 2025 lifestyle isn’t just about a $500 million net worth, a Georgia compound, or a private jet with his logo on it.

It’s a story of a guy who took the same force he used in the paint and applied it to money, brands, and real estate. The jerseys are retired. The Orlando mansion belongs to someone else. But the empire he’s built means one thing. Even long after he stopped playing, Shaq is still living exactly like the superstar he always