Feature Writer
The winner's curse looms large in lottery lore.
There's Buddy Post, a former circus cook who won $16.2 million in a 1988 Pennsylvania lottery. Six years later, he was bankrupt, divorced and the subject of a bungled murder plot – his brother had hired a hit man to kill him.
Ontario's Ibi Roncaioli claimed a $5 million lottery prize in 1991. Last year, her husband was convicted in her 2003 poisoning death.
Jack Whittaker from West Virginia scored $315 million in a Powerball jackpot in 2002. In addition to numerous legal run-ins, he suffered terrible personal loss: his beloved only granddaughter, with whom he shared the fortune, turned drug addict and was found dead. "I wish," Whittaker told ABC News, "I'd torn that ticket up."
Ah, the perils of sudden wealth. As Canada's new national lottery, Lotto Max, launches ticket sales next Saturday with a first draw on Sept. 25, there will be big jackpots and more million-dollar prizes, more happy dance delirium and more down-the-road pitfalls.
"None of us appreciate the difficulties and challenges," says financial planner Susan Bradley, founder of the Florida-based Sudden Money Institute. A lottery win, "ends the way life is for you."
Boo-hoo. A financially-flush new life sure sounds appealing: Caribbean getaways, a Paris pied-à-terre, a spanking new medical wing in your very own name. The downside? An identity crisis, increased wariness, strained relationships and a flood of strangers' sob stories.
"We should all have their problems," laughs H. Roy Kaplan, a sociologist at the University of South Florida, who has written about lottery winners.
Over the years, he has met about 500 of them, the prudent and the impulsive. While American winners tend to buy showy mansions, Canadians, he found, renovate.
"Although there may be tough times," says Kaplan, "by and large people's lives are enhanced by winning."
That was Jan's experience. The office worker, who asked that her last name not be used, is one of Bray Motors' 25 employees – the entire full-time staff – who shared $22.5 million last summer. A sweet $900,000 each.
She bought a new Chevrolet Equinox, renovated the house and put away a nest egg. Some of the older employees retired from the GM dealership in Sundridge, but others are still on the job.
"Life is just a little easier," she says. "I think we all benefited because it wasn't enough money to go wild and crazy. No one did."
So how much do you need to go wild and crazy?
One person's chump change is another's pot of gold. Bradley, whose clients include professional athletes and heirs, as well as the lottery lucky, has witnessed people spin out of control after a prize of a few hundred thousand.
One woman, a city worker in her early 30s, won $250,000 in a settlement and started buying houses and cars. Says Bradley: "She told me, `People like me need a Lexus.' She got herself into financial trouble that will take the rest of her working career to get out of."
Instant millionaires can easily slide into ruin, she says. "There's a stress response with winning. The fight or flight part of your brain starts operating. The person's ability to see the big picture is diminished."
Personality quirks come into play. The party person lives large until the money runs out. A shy, inhibited person may withdraw further, suspicious of people's motives.
Bad feelings are not uncommon. Few winners are prepared for all the expectations of largesse, says Kaplan.
Raymond Sobeski, of Princeton, Ont., had an inkling of this in 2003. He waited almost a year to claim his $30 million during which time he divorced his wife. His ex then launched a lawsuit for her share that turned into an ugly legal battle. They did reach a support settlement in 2005.
Winning is an isolating experience, explains Bradley. "You're suddenly different than your peers."
So if you win the lottery, what should you do?
Nothing precipitous, say the experts. Forget the one-way ticket to the Riviera. Get a good financial planner and stay calm.
"I've met people who complained that winning was full of headaches," says Kaplan. "But nobody ever told me they were giving it back."
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