If I won the Lottery

First a confession. I very rarely play the lottery. We have Mega Millions and Powerball here in Maryland and I usually only buy a ticket if the jackpot is huge. Now I know people will tell you that you do not need 300 million dollars or even 200 Million after the Government takes their share. But I think you do. Especially if the jackpot is that big. Now you always hear about the curse of the lottery winners. Their lives are changed forever, well duh. But they also begin to have a bad time and it is because money does change people. What the winners forget is that if they are smart with their money I don't think it will be bad for them. Yeah you may still have weirdos trying to get money out of you, but if you lived your life right you should not have to many whack jobs waiting to take you out. Course I could be wrong since I still have never won the lottery. But I have a general idea what I would do with my winnings that would keep me and my family wealthy til the day I die.

Say I win 300 million dollars. My advice to you is take the lump sum which may drop it to 250 or so, but you only have to pay taxes on that once. Whereas if you get the monthly check, you pay taxes every month. You may end up getting your 300 million but it would take at least 25 years to get it all I think is what they say. So the Government takes their share which drops it close to 190 million or so. Still alot of money.

The smart thing then is to put a good portion into a savings account, or Swiss bank account, or IRA or whatever so you get interest on it. Say drop 20 mil or 25 mil into an account. I would then pay off all outstanding bills, credit cards, house payments, college loans etc.  Then set up trust funds for the kids. If you like your family like I do, give them all some money as well if you can. I have heard from some other people that you cannot do that and it doesnt make sense to me why you couldn't it's your money. But if I could, I would give the families the money not individual people, like I would give money to my sister's family, my mother, my father, my in-laws families and they could do what they want with it. My gift to them.  But I digress.

Charity, because it will allow you to keep yourself grounded. Pick a bunch of charities you are interested in and give money to them. The amount can be worked out when you take a look at how much you won and how you budgeted it out. I would give money to charities that worked to stop cruelty to animals and children. There may be more out there but I would have to do my research.

If you believe in a divine spirit, giving money to your church would also probably be a good idea. The church despite some of the recent headlines, actually does good work for those less fortunate then us and also those who have lost hope. Plus due to the odds a divine spirit must have helped you out to win so you should never go against your luck either. Give money to your church.

Then you can have some fun with it. But remember do not go overboard. I would probably buy a house or a plot of land where a house can be built. Then I can either custom build it to suit my family or redesign the existing one to fit my needs. Maybe go on a nice vacation, or a couple of nice vacations. Down the line I may also consider investing in something like a business or a strip mall. Or maybe I would also probably buy a new car, though nothing ostentatious.

Because going crazy and spending all your money at one time on crazy things like a solid gold car are going to quickly make you lose the money. You want to keep a constant flow of money into your life because if you spend it like crazy it will go away much quicker and you will be hit with the curse. Using some common sense and not losing your shit at the sight of 190 million dollars will keep you very well taken care of for the forseeable future.