James Gunn Confirms The Guardians Of The Galaxy Are Knowhere's New Landlords

"The Guardians of the Galaxy Holiday Special" introduced a number of key elements to the MCU, including Groot's new form and the fact that Mantis (Pom Klementieff) is actually Peter's sister. With that in mind, one question raised by a fan who saw the special was how The Guardians bought Knowhere and who they bought it from. According to James Gunn (via Twitter): The Guardians purchased Knowhere from The Collector (Benicio Del Toro) after Thanos (Josh Brolin) attacked it in his hunt for The Reality Stone in "Avengers: Infinity War." Now they are helping to fix it. Per Gunn, "Although the Guardians are sometimes heroes, they work as mercenaries & it brings in a fair amount of money. So after Thanos attacked Knowhere they bought it from the Collector. It was a burnt-out husk & they've been rebuilding it."

One well-known aspect of the Guardians is that they do not always perform heroics out of a sense of charity. They often want to get paid for the work they do. As confirmed by Gunn in his response to that fan: The Guardians are now the rightful owners of Knowhere after buying it following Thanos' rampage through the galaxy, and Knowhere is serving as their base of operations while they help to rebuild the once-destroyed Celestial head/cosmic space colony.