More than once you’ve probably thought that there are many things you don’t do in life because you don’t have the money. You don’t start your own business because you don’t have the money, you don’t invest because you don’t have the money, and that’s when people tend to say something like: “If I won the lottery, I would…“. The problem is that many people, faced with this incredible stroke of luck, end up doing none of the things they once said they would do if they had money.
Below are a few examples of people who became millionaires thanks to a lottery prize and did exactly what many of us would probably do.
I won’t give these people’s names, to avoid any “adverse reactions”. You may even have seen some of them on television. All you need to know is that they are real people and real cases, and they illustrate something very clearly: “A fool and his money are soon parted.“
Millionaire A
At 33 he received €15 million from a lottery, enough money never to have to work again. But of course, if you’re not going to work, at least put your money to work for you. As we all know, €1 million on its own can generate around €40,000 a year, more than the average employee earns.
Well, this person managed the hardest part, something that would seem almost impossible if you set out to do it on purpose. He spent his entire fortune in 8 years. He is now on the unemployment rolls, and his house is waiting to be repossessed by the bank.
See also: Things to do in your 20s to be rich by 30
He didn’t start a business and he didn’t invest, but he certainly enjoyed himself, at least for 8 years.
Millionaire B
€40 million for a father of two (a dream come true for anyone). Twelve months after collecting the prize, he had his first problem: his wife divorced him and took 50% of the winnings. Even so, he still had €20 million.
In the third year, his elder son died of a cocaine overdose, when before the lottery win his only vice had been work.
Five years on, this millionaire father was attending Alcoholics Anonymous with his other son, with only €257 in his bank account and a bank order to repossess his home. Nobody knows what he spent the money on, because you don’t blow €20 million on cocaine and alcohol alone… or maybe you do.
Millionaire C
A 47-year-old worker received €24 million from the lottery and wanted to pursue his dream: a company of his own, for himself and his children. He didn’t hesitate. At least this man wanted to carry out a worthwhile project, but luck wasn’t on his side.
He made every mistake we always warn entrepreneurs not to make. First and foremost, he wasn’t prepared to run a business, he didn’t know the industry he went into, and he hired advisers who squeezed him dry rather than advising him.
Within 5 years he closed the company and paid off all the debts he had taken on. At least he kept around €150,000 in capital and his home is not at risk of repossession, so he is still working as he did before he became a millionaire.
This man’s case makes me sad, because his dreams were cut short purely by lack of knowledge. I’m reminded of a line from Wall Street: it’s much better never to have had money than to have had it and lost it. Only he could tell us what that feels like, although, fortunately, he still has a financial cushion.
Millionaire D
A stock market investor, used to earning returns on his money, received €1.5 million. He knew he could multiply that capital very easily, but haste is a bad adviser. He had been a focused, patient investor, and now he entered the world of the financial sharks, where real millionaires make millions in a single day.
He changed the way he invested and put his money into risky, short-term securities, so he kept racking up losses, and the more he lost, the more of a hurry he was in to win it back. The end of the story for this investor was a string of failed investments that led him to take out a loan to keep investing. Today he is completely and utterly bankrupt.
With this article I want to show just one thing: if we had asked these people, before they became millionaires, whether they thought they would have problems if they won the lottery, none of them would have imagined their story ending this way. Knowing what happened to them, are you sure you’d be ready to receive a large sum of money?
Further reading
Featured image: Santeri Viinamäki, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons.
