Ever wondered what happens to lottery winners who choose the publicity option?
Here’s a few reminders as to why you should not get too carried away sharing the excitement of your big win…
Winning Syndicate Visited by Crime GangA group of 30 factory workers and craftmen from Avellino in Italy won 33 Million Euros on Italy’s SuperEnaLotto in January 2008.
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What Happens To Lottery Winners (Stay Anonymous)!
I’m looking for a lotto/powerball wheeling system that will allow me to enter ALL my lottery numbers. Plus let me select the number of lines I want to play.
Can anyone help?
Real good advice. I already had this in mind as I have a very large family. But don’t forget it’s 14 million to one, so at nearly 80 I will have to get a move on.
Hi Henry
And I’m sure that family will appreciate it when you win big 🙂
14 million to 1 could be worse (the UK Lotto odds are way better than a lot of games). But hey, if you buy two tickets it’s down to 7 million to 1. Or play in a syndicate like one of these, and it can be down to as little as 1-in-317,814 for the jackpot.
This is real good advice u have here about lotto winners who beat the odds and win big. Keep a low profile, stay anonymous.
If you scoop the jackpot it’s going to be impossible to hide the trappings of your new wealth. Rather than deny winning, it might be better to pretend you had a 5+bonus then you can explain the new car etc, without raising people’s expectations that you can e.g. pay off their mortgage for them.
If you played two tickets your odds would not be cut to 7 million to 1! That is like saying if you bought 14 tickets the odds would only be 1 million to 1. If you buy two tickets your odds are 14 million to 2. And you call yourself lottery-guy!
Yes, if you buy two tickets, your odds are 14 million to 2.
But that’s exactly the same as 7 million to 1.
Just like 14 million to 14 million, is the same as 1 to 1.
Back to school Gary 🙂
Sorry but 2 tickets doesn’t take an odds of 14 million to one down to 7 million to one. It just means you have 2 chances in 14 million to win. It’s not a case of fractions sorry to say.
As for privacy, better to say you just got a job working for some rich guy which comes with its own house and company car, then you can explain the trappings easier. Here in the states (I’m an ex pat) you don’t have the option of staying anon so you have to say something or at least accept your picture is going to be in the paper with the winning cheque.
You should maybe spend a few weeks growing facial hair (if your a guy, lets not get woolly mammoth) and then wear a cap and glasses and maybe a false moustache, then after move some where new where you can reinvent yourself if you wish… just get a PFM (personal financial manager) and see a therapist (happiness is achieved not bought, so get some help achieving it) and then go to some classes for money management so you can understand what your advisers are telling you but don’t think you can take over running your new empire. At least not until you have a few masters degrees and years of working for someone else’s company.
Happiness isn’t a cigar called hamlet, but knowing your taking your money seriously and professionally getting advice for emotions, finances, employment, and health matters can sure help you get one step higher then those who don’t.
Thanks for the comment Jason. Some good advice for those lottery companies that don’t care what happens to lottery winners and insist on publicity (it is good for ticket sales after all…).
My alternative suggestion is to insist that you’ve had a serious facial accident. And the complete, full head and face bandaging cannot be removed for at least 12 months…
But you are wrong on the odds though – back to school for you too!
2 in 14 million IS exactly the same as 1 in 7 million.
Just like if you bought half the possible combinations, you’d have a 50% change of winning the jackpot. 7 million in 14 million, or 1 in 2, right?
Just like if it was a dice. 2 in 6 becomes 1 in 3, or a third etc.
You’ve got the maths wrong by being half right. You are correct in that a fraction of 2 in 14 can be factored down to 1 in 7, but this does not apply to lottery odds. When you buy two tickets you have doubled your chances of winning, not halved the odds. Think of it this way, there are fourteen million possible ticket combinations, buying two tickets gives you two chances to win, it does not half the number of available tickets.
No, you’re wrong John (why do so many people get this wrong!?). Read my comments above.
Back to school for you too then 🙂
John’s explanation (‘…there are fourteen million possible ticket combinations, buying two tickets gives you two chances to win, it does not half [sic] the number of available tickets.’) seems to me entirely correct.
You assert that it isn’t but you don’t explain why it isn’t.
Buying 2 tickets means you have covered 2 of the 14 million combinations. It’s basic math that this simplifies to odds of 1 in 7 million. No, you haven’t halved the number of tickets, but you have doubled the number you have bought.
Just like if you bought 7 million different tickets, you would now have 7 million in 14 million, or 1 in 2.
Think of it in terms of a dice. If you bet on 1 number, it’s 1 in 6, right? But if you bet on 2 numbers that’s 2 in 6 – which simplifies to 1 in 3 (or a third / 33% chance).
In Canada, winners cannot be anonymous in order to show the games are honest.
Is that the case for all of Canada? Sometimes different States/Provinces have different rules.
But don’t be fooled by the reasons why – it’s perfectly possible to ensure, and prove, a game is honest without resorting to ‘outing’ winners.
Publishing winners details is all about selling more lottery tickets. Every lottery should have the option for winners to remain anonymous should they choose to.
I have been studying the lottery for almost 20 years, and winners always say they can handle it but few do. The lucky ones learn from their mistakes before they spend everything. Others were prepared by either their personality or career to handle such a large sum.
Alas the common effect is that they lose a lot learning and it creates rifts within their family or close relationships that continue long after the win, sometimes permanent.
It’s extreme but I’d put the winners through a 6 week course of financial management before they can pick up their check, no buying anything and only having an income while they learn… help them help themselves.
It does come down to financial sense. Maybe winners could be tested on that, and strongly recommended to take a course if they fail!
Don’t be fooled by the media though. The vast majority of lottery winners do NOT lose it all.
If you think about how many jackpot winners there are all over world every single week, going back years. And compare that with the occasional ‘lottery winner loses it all’ story.
Bad news stories get more press, so they always seem bigger than they are.
My advice – stop spending money on depressing newspapers, and buy some extra lottery tickets instead 🙂
Oh I know the vast majority don’t lose it all. But they do lose a lot of money learning what they could have known from day one.
Some people leave the money in one account in their bank which can be OK for them. Unless as recently their bank goes belly up and they only have the right to get $250,000 back.
Some become the family ATM and become resentful for it. Some fund educations and then every member of their close or extended family thinks of them as the family scholorship fund. Relatives come for vacations to their nice home, and then the winner needs a team of horses to drag them back out.
These things and more have happened. Sometimes it’s buying too big a house and they feel like a pea in a drum. All sorts of things that financial managers and therapists could help them deal with, I just listed the financial side but it’s as much mental.
When the UK lottery started they had a team of experts to help the winners of large amounts, America doesn’t have that.
With the lottery here, your cash is chopped by 2/3 for tax, it takes weeks to get the money and the media is a lot more extreme. With the UK Lotto, no taxes and you get the money in a week or two.
Lots of money sounds great. But the fact you got thrown in at the deep end makes it harder to learn to swim.