Why do I call them as dumbest lottery winners?
Because they have broken the stupid limits of what one can do with money. Most of us are trying to hit $1 million in our retirement portfolio, which will make us set for life.
What if I say a person after winning millions or multi-million dollars with their lottery ticket is still broke? Does it make sense Why I say, they are dumb lottery winners?
You are not going to find one or two such personalities in this article, sadly but many.
I strongly believe there is always a lesson to learn from others’ mistakes. Money lessons are not an exception!
Read More: How to be a financial genius?
Top 5 dumbest lottery winners:
- Michael Carroll:
Michael Carroll is an English who won 9.7 million pounds (roughly $14 million) at the UK National Lottery in 2002 when he was aged 19.
Even a documentary & books has been published on his life.
When Carroll won the lottery he was working in a temporary Job as a garbage collector. He even didn’t had a bank account to deposit his windfall.
At the time of winning, Carroll claimed all he wants a 3 bedroom house near lakeside since he loves fishing & he will be cautious about spending.
But it all turned out be delusion, soon he started to spent lavishly.
He bought himself a BMW, Mercedes, Gold Jewelry’s. He gave chunk of money to his family members. He became a kind of celebrity in UK.
He threw heavy parties & boasted he has slept with 4000 women, pay for orgies etc. By becoming an instant millionaire, he got addicted to drug, cocaine & alcohol.
It is reported that he spends nearly $2000 on cocaine & bottle of Vodka everyday. Soon he spent all the money , become dead broke & went to work in a biscuit company.
One good thing he got reunited with his Ex- wife after he was broke. That’s a kind of silver lining.
2. Evelyn Adams
Evelyn Adams is a special one!
Why? She is lucky to win lottery twice in within a span of four months.
The odds of winning lottery in one’s time is one in 3.2 million and the second one is 1 in 5.2 million.
After winning $5.4 million in lottery, she received her Jackpot payments in annuity basis , with a total of $218,000 paid annually after 20% was deducted for taxes.
While some of her family & friends were happy for Evelyn’s new found wealth, while others resented it.
She planned to use her winnings to study music & open a music store, but bought & sold the convenience store she had worked before.
Evelyn was addicted to gambling & gave money to many acquaintances in loan, Later the don’t feel the obligation to repay their debt.
Evelyn Adams is living in trail park now ,In an interview Evelyn consider the reason of losing her wealth is “I never learned one simple word in the English language ” No”.
3) Janite Lee
Janite Lee is a south korean immigrant who won big in the state lottery.
In 1993, she was operating a wig shop in St. Louis where she won the Illinois state lottery changing her life forever.
At age 52, She won a whopping amount of $18 million which puts her in the top 1% of wealthy at that time in united states.
She choose receive her winning as an annuity instead of lumpsum, resulting in an yearly payment of $612,000 – certainly enough money to live off the rest of her life.
Lee chose to give away her money to various Politicial donations including presidential campaign. Her giving gave access to dine with famous politicians like Bill Clinton and Al Gore.
She also made significant donations to education institutions , where a reading room is after Lee’s name at Washington University School of Law.
Due to her irresponsible financial decisions, like leasing luxury cars and borrowing millions from bank, excessive purchases on credit cards led to her downfall.
In year 2001, Lee once made the headlines for filing bankruptcy. At the time of her filing, Lee had less than $700 in her bank account and accumulated $2.5 million in debt.
4) William Bud post
The fourth dumb lottery winners on the list is William “Bud” Post III.
In 1988, Post bought one of the winning tickets of Pennsylvania lottery worth $16 million.
After two weeks of winning, Post collected first of his 26 annual payments worth $497,953. He spent more than $300,000 dollars on gifts & various investments such as liquor license, a lease for a restaurant, used car lot, Twin engine airplane despite not owing pilot license.
In the first year, his debts raised to $500,000. In next year, he bought a mansion in Oil city, Pennsylvania for $395,000.
Post faced various legal issues such as Ann Karpik his landlady & girlfriend successfully sued him for one third of his winning. Ann claimed she had bought 40 tickets for Post and decided to split their winnings among the two.
Post brother hired a hit man to kill post to inherit his winning. But this attempt was unsuccessful.
Post had fired his shotgun at a man who was coming to his mansion to collect a debt.
He was also ordered by a court to stay away from his sixth wife after he fired his shotgun into her car.
Post complained ” I was happier when I was broke” .
In 1996 he had had enough and tried to auction off the rest of the lottery payments along with his mansion in a hope to clear his bills. He told once “Once I’m no longer a lottery winner, people will leave me alone. That’s all I want. Just peace of mind.”
Except he could not stop his wild spending.
He served in prison for shooting at a debt collector, upon the release he was living on food stamps and $450 disability check.
Later, he died at the age of 66. At the end of his , Post was $1 million in debt.
5) David lee Edward’s
The fifth dumb lottery winners on the list is ” David lee Edwards“.
David Lee Edwards originally from Kentucky won $27 million in lottery winnings in 2001.
Edward was penniless in five years after his lottery winning.
He purchased a £1.2million, 6,000-square-foot house in a private tennis and golf community in Palm Beach Gardens, Florida, then spent £480,000 on another home nearby.
Edwards then paid £1.5million for a private Jet, bought three losing racehorses and even invested a fibre optics installation company and a limo business for £3.5million.
All his business ventures failed, Due to excessive spending, drug use , he was forced to live shelter shed.
Sadly David died at 58 in a hospital. Before his winning, Edward spent a third of his life in prison for robbery charges.
Money Lessons for us
- Lack of Advice:
None of the lottery winners never took any advice nor has any experience in handling money, which makes them ” one dumb lottery winners”
Except for David Lee Edwards none of the lottery winners approached any Financial advisor. But Financial advisor Gibbs stated, if David followed my advice he would pulling $85,000 month for the rest of his life.
$85,000 is not chump change. David’s money were invested in the combination of stocks and bond. But David didn’t listen to Gibbs, pulled the money to fund his luxury spending.
Takeaway: Take advice from professionals if you don’t know how to handle.
- Habits
Making money and handling money are both different skills.
Most of the lottery winners gone broke due to their habits. It could be excessive Drug intake, Alcohol , Gambling, Giving away for fame etc.
After winning the lottery, they could be on the top of world but to stay there you need to watch out for money killer habits.
Takeaway: Grow good habits & weed out the bad habits.
- Excessive spending
Another money lesson we have here is excessive spending.
Even tens of millions won’t last if you don’t control your spendings.
Buying things like mansion, owning many luxury cars, private Jets, etc are the short cut to become poor once again.
Takeaway: Budget, Budget , Budget! It always helps & protects your wealth.
What is instant millionaire?
Instant millionaire are the folks who become millionaire by overnight.
It could be wealth earned in the form of lottery winning like power ball, family inheritance, etc. Its an easy way to become wealthy, but few people are lucky to be instant millionaire.
Personally I feel, Most of people who become millionaires by earning, saving and investing has the temperament to handle their wealth rather than the instant millionaire.
Final Thoughts:
Its sad to see the state of these dumb lottery winners, but they had become an example to the masses to show what happens if you are not careful with handling money.
Acquiring Cars, Mansion, Giving away money in loan to family & friends is definitely not a wise path to handle your money.
They had left the world, but not the money lessons they left for us!
Thank You for reading!
