It takes luck to win the lottery, but it is necessary to be good at managing a lot of money to remain rich or even get richer. It is common for lottery winners to become dazzled at their prizes and spend it all in a period of a couple of years. However, I have brought lottery success stories about winners who are still rich to prove that it is not a rule.
As long as you keep playing the lottery to have a chance and follow the example of successful lottery winners, you are already halfway there.
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14 Stories of Successful Lottery Winners Who Remain Rich
It is about time we get to know the lottery winners who are still rich years after their lottery prize. Their success stories brought with details might work as an inspiration for you. Not all exciting lottery winners’ stories have a happy ending, but these fifteen do.
1. John and Lisa Robinson – $500 Million
If you keep an eye on high jackpots to play when the prizes are larger, you might know the Robinsons. The largest jackpot ever paid by Powerball, a total of $1.586 Billion, went to three different tickets. One of them belonged to John and Lisa Robinson from Tennessee.
Source: fox13memphis.com
We started this list with quite an easy task, as it is truly difficult to spend that much money, but they made the right decisions anyway. Their money went to purchasing estate properties, without forgetting a $6.2 million house for themselves. That is how they are still rich after winning the lottery.
Lesson: Real estate may be an investment option for lottery winners.
2. Pearlie Mae Smith – $429 Million
The family of Pearlie Smith followed Christian beliefs, and their prayers to win the lottery were heard. When Pearlie Smith won the Powerball jackpot in 2016, they paid off debts that would continue to increase with interest if they had ignored them and then established the Smith Family Foundation.
Source: nytimes.com
In order to keep themselves rich, aside from having won a really big jackpot, they did not spend it on superfluous items. They chose to invest in their local community through the foundation and, with the correct allocation of the money, it supports the local families through education and the development of the neighborhood.
Lesson: Pay off your debts and stay away from superfluous and expensive items.
3. Lerynne West – $349.9 million
Another successful case of a Powerball lottery winner who is still rich is the one of Lerynne West. She was the lucky winner of $349.9 million in a Powerball drawing in November 2018. Like other winners, she first bought her house, which was her first, and then decided how she wanted to use that money. To remain rich, she opted for maintaining a low profile, without luxury, and there is still plenty of money to donate to several causes.
Source: weareiowa.com
Lesson: Keep a low profile to avoid unnecessary expenses.
4. Neal Wanless – $232.1 Million
Neal Wanless had a taste of how it is to be broke and decided never to feel that again when he became a lottery winner. He was selling scrap metal and living in a camper when he decided to buy $5 worth of Powerball tickets at a gas station, which happened to carry his lucky numbers.
With that big prize of over $232 million, he bought his family a 50,000-acre ranch that has been evaluated at over $40 million already. That is a good investment case for a lottery winner who is still rich.
Lesson: Invest in something that you are familiar with.
5. Brad Duke – $220 million
Brad Duke stars in one of the most successful stories of lottery winners who are still rich, especially because he has made himself much richer. He won the incredible amount of $220 million from Powerball in Idaho but was left with $74 million after taxes. He took that money and made several investments, probably under advisory, in oil, gas, real estate, and bonds.
Source: bbc.co.uk
His plan is to turn his winnings into $1 billion, and while we do not know if he is close to that achievement, we know that he already has nine figures under his name, plus a $1.3 million foundation for his family.
Lesson: You may get richer by diversifying your investments.
6. Sue and Paul Rosenau – $181.2 Million
The Rosenaus won a big Powerball jackpot back in 2008, and, unlike many cases, they knew what to do with the money. They established an organization to increase the awareness of the Krabbe disease and help the families to pay for medical expenses and treatment, as well as research and development.
Like every winner who has planned what to do with the winnings and did not spend on useless items, they remain rich.
Lesson: Having a good plan tends to help winners to save their money.
7. Cynthia P. Stafford – $112 Million
Cynthia P. Stafford from California is a clear example of how prosperous thoughts have already helped lottery winners. She had a really hard financial situation and focused on winning a Mega Millions prize, sleeping with her winning number under her pillow every day until she finally won it in January 2007.
Her $112 million prize was useful to pay off her debts and finally start her film company, a dream she had carried for several years. Believe it or not, she continues to play the lottery, hoping to win another jackpot.
Lesson: Put your prize to work for you with a company of your own.
8. Jason Fry – $47 Million
Moving away from the Powerball and Mega Millions jackpots, we have the great case of a lottery winner who is still rich after winning the Florida Lotto. He did not avoid the enjoyment of his prize, buying himself a new car and spending it with family and friends.
Source: fortmyers.floridaweekly.com/
However, he was smart and bought himself a golf driving range generating him $300,000 per year, which is far more than most people do. His investments did not stop there, and he continued to acquire stores. That is how he managed to remain rich.
Lesson: Enjoy your money but do not forget about investing it as well.
9. Bob Erb – $25 Million
After playing the lottery for 43 years, Bob finally won $25 million by playing Lotto Max in Canada in 2012. At the age of 60, he was already not so interested in luxurious life, so he kept the money and sustained a low-profile life, even keeping his daily job. However, he decided to donate his salary to the food bank.
Lesson: If you do not feel the need to spend your money, simply go on with your normal life.
10. Peter Lavery – GBP 10.2 Million
Another successful case of investment from a lottery jackpot, Peter Lavery won £10.2 million back in 1996 playing the UK National Lottery. Before the prize, he earned his life with a simple salary driving a bus.
With that millionaire prize, he decided to enter a venture of whiskey with Cooley Whiskey Distillery of the Danny Boy brand. Nowadays, he has dozens of properties across Northern Ireland, making him over three times richer than he was when he won the lottery.
Lesson: You can get many times richer by investing your lottery prize.
11. Allen and Violet Large – $11.2 Million
What do you consider as being rich? Risking sounding too cliché, I would like to insert at least one case of a couple who noticed that they had no need for that money at the age of 70. Retired, without debts, and living a happy life, the couple Allen and Violet Large gave a different end to their Lotto 6/49 prize.
They decided to donate the whole of their lottery prize to hospitals in Nova Scotia, as well as to churches, the fire department, and good causes in general. They felt good about it and noticed no need to make another use of that money.
Lesson: Sometimes, we already have all we need and may contribute to others.
12. Richard Lustig – About $1 Million
Richard Lustig is a well-known name in the lottery industry because he wrote one of the best-sellers lottery books on how to win the lottery. In fact, his fame even made his name be used for other projects that cannot really be connected to him, like the scam Lotto Dominator.
That would sound like he is a multiple jackpot winner, but the truth is that he accumulated a bit over $1 million over the course of 17 years. He made money out of scratch-off tickets and a couple of lottery prizes, plus the sale of his books. Regardless of whether his books were worth buying, he knew how to benefit from them.
Lesson: Richard Lustig built himself fame and made money out of it.
13. Yancy Hicks – $1 Million
Yancy Hicks is living proof that not only multimillionaire jackpots result in lottery winners who are still rich. He made $1 million playing the Illinois Lotto when he was a McDonald’s employee and continued to work there for four months until he had a plan. That plan involved paying for his daughter’s college, acquiring a car, and buying a Subway shop, which made him much more money.
Lesson: Even smaller prizes can make you rich if you invest them well.
14. Robert Salo – $1,000 Per Week for Life
No one gets rich fast by winning $1,000 per week for life, but that was the prize that Robert Salo won from a scratch-off ticket worth $2. However, he established a good long-run plan and invested that money in his college education instead of parties and trips.
Since his achievement in 2012, he has made about $480,000 out of that prize alone and is possibly taking care of his new career.
Lesson: Small regular prizes can give you the comfort to pursue your dreams.
Is It Possible to Win the Lottery and Stay Rich?
When you win the lottery, there is no natural force or civil duty that makes money go away faster than the one achieved through work. Therefore, you can still remain rich after you win the lottery, and it is not by not using the money.
Of course, you will want to spend that money and enjoy your life, but the path to remain rich for decades, possibly making your grandchildren rich too, is through proper management. It starts by knowing what to do if you win the lottery, which includes professional and trustworthy advice.
Money makes money, and, through the right guidance, you may invest a portion of the money so that you might win several times the amount of that lottery prize in a few years. That is not only possible but also a fact carried out by other successful lottery winners who are still rich.
Has Anyone Ever Won the Lottery and Became Even Richer?
Yes, there are plenty of cases of lottery winners who not only maintained their new lifestyle but also made even more money. You will find a couple of those below, and those winners continue to apply the strategies and investments, meaning that they will possibly only get even richer.
7 Tips on How to Win the Lottery and Remain Rich
- Check the estimated amount of taxes on your winnings beforehand with the lottery tax calculator.
- Establish a good financial plan, preferably with professional help, when you win the lottery.
- Separate a reasonable portion of the prize for investments, and do not touch it for anything else.
- Pay off any debts that you might have before making investments.
- Avoid telling others and preferably opt for being an anonymous lottery winner.
- Never invest everything in only one asset. Look out for diversification.
- Look for the easiest lottery games for the best odds of winning and accelerate the process.
- You should also check your odds with a calculator to understand your chances of winning the lottery game.
- Play on the online lottery sites to play the lotteries that can actually make people rich!
By following the tips and the lessons acquired here, you are ready to remain rich or become even richer after you win the lottery. However, you need to play first to be able to win any prize, so good luck!