If you won the lottery ...

[NWFlyer 2]

The post on the recent lottery win by some British skydivers got me to thinking ... how would you handle a huge windfall? Seems there are a lot of sad stories out there about people who win the lottery and less than a decade later find themselves in worse financial shape than when they started.

Not that I even play, but I'd like to think this would be my approach.

1) Take the lump sum rather than annual payments.

2) Immediately set aside whatever I'd owe in taxes (assuming that amount hadn't already been taken out of the payment I received).

3) Put 95+% in a relatively illiquid low-risk but relatively short-term account ... to force a "cooling off period." Basically, this would lock the money up for 6 months to a year so that I have plenty of time to plot a longer-term strategy for investing, saving, spending, donating, dealing with the parasites that would come out of the woodwork, etc.

THEN I'd figure out what kind of fun to have.

How would you deal with it?

"There is only one basic human right, the right to do as you damn well please. And with it comes the only basic human duty, the duty to take the consequences." -P.J. O'Rourke

[wildcard451 0]

hookers and blow.

[happythoughts 0]

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hookers and blow.

I was going to say, Megan Fox, but that is now a redundant answer.

[fallinbear 0]

My own airplane, personal pilot, and a nice house with a BIIIIIIIIIG yard...
And maybe a second rig...

I don't want to make all the decisions because if I screw up, then I can't blame it on you...

[AggieDave 6]

First, the house gets paid off, same with the student loans. We do not quit our jobs, those stay. A financial adviser would have to help us setup the right mix of proper investments to make the money work for my family for the rest of our lives. Grayson would get a fund setup to pay for his college completely (if he went to Texas A&M).

The buying of a HUGE house and sports cars would not be an appropriate course of action.

--"When I die, may I be surrounded by scattered chrome and burning gasoline."

[muff528 3]

Sadly, a Florida lottery winner ultimately found himself buried under a concrete slab about 2 years after he took a lump-sum payout of 17 million. He was constantly hounded for money by "friends" and strangers until, finally, he was allegedly scammed out of what was left and then murdered. His disappearance and murder was covered-up since April 2009 until his body was discovered last month.

[cocheese 0]

I would become the "Huge Hefner" of skydiving.

I have it all figured out.

edit: And i would put all the other "Pizza-in-a-Cup" guys out of business.

[VTmotoMike08 0]

First I would have a huge party. I'll be smart about it eventually, but I won't feel too bad about having some fun upfront.

I'll get a couple tailgate planes, some big helo's, a few ballons, fill em up with kegs and food, pick up all my friends and fly out to a big open field someplace warm and jump for a couple weeks
After the hangover wears off, I'll hire a professional money manager (and make sure he his honest and well payed) to figure out a way to make the rest of the money work for me while living off the interest comfortably for the rest of my life.

I don't really care how he invests it as long as it nets me about ~500K/ year for the rest of my life. I could do everything that I want in this world with that much money. Upon my death, I'll leave it all to an assortment of charities as I don't plan on having any kids.

[quade 3]

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First, the house gets paid off, same with the student loans. We do not quit our jobs, those stay. A financial adviser would have to help us setup the right mix of proper investments to make the money work for my family for the rest of our lives. Grayson would get a fund setup to pay for his college completely (if he went to Texas A&M).

The buying of a HUGE house and sports cars would not be an appropriate course of action.

Actually Dave a pretty good argument could be made for buying a slightly better house in this housing depressed market as an investment and resetting the clock on mortgage payments since it is a tax advantage.

quade -
The World's Most Boring Skydiver

[Anvilbrother 0]

Pay off all bills and current house. Pay for my daughters education, give some to parents and inlaws. Set up a conservative but safe place for the money and put enough in to live just off the interest without touching principal.

If there is enough left over buy a private place for my dz to move to so we will have less of a chance to be harassesd by government or locals, build the required buildings, runway, pay off the plane, and clear their debt. Spend the rest on beer and stupid sh!t for the jumpers at the dz.

Postes r made from an iPad or iPhone. Spelling and gramhair mistakes guaranteed move along,

[jimmytavino 16]

Wow!!!!! how very sensible....

so If YOU won, NWFlyer.. i guess i'd have to ( sadly) leave My wife and Kids,,
and do my best to woo YOU, away from your man,,, so that WE could get married!!!!!

now If I was the winner,,,, I've said it before, and i'd still do it.....
I'd spend a couple of million,, Buy a nice Otter, hire a crew,,,, and twice a year,,, host a group of a dozen different friends,, and we would head out for a skydiving pilgrimage.. viisting 3 or 4 places on each trip.....when not on the 'road', i'd sell 10 dollar skydives,,, at the local dzs.... ( 5 bucks for me, and 5 bucks for the DZOs.....),,, nah!!! make it 7 for me, and 3 for them!!!!

I'd also pay the property taxes for my Folks and each of my 4 siblings.. for the next 10 years worth.... ( that way, i wouldn't feel guilty, about the otter )

"so this woman races into the house, and YELLS up the stairs.. 'pack the bags, i WON the lottery' .."
A mans' excited voice replies..."should i pack for the mountians,?? or pack for the Beach"??
She yells back.. " I don't CARE!!!! just GET OUT " !!!

jt

[AggieDave 6]

The housing market really isn't all that depressed in my part of Texas, so although I agree with you, it wouldn't be the first priority.

Besides, the house I'm in right now would be the perfect house for my parent's retirement home (if they would be willing to move here).

--"When I die, may I be surrounded by scattered chrome and burning gasoline."

[kingbunky 3]

Peter Gibbons: What would you do if you had a million dollars?
Lawrence: I'll tell you what I'd do, man: two chicks at the same time, man.
Peter Gibbons: That's it? If you had a million dollars, you'd do two chicks at the same time?
Lawrence: Damn straight. I always wanted to do that, man. And I think if I were a millionaire I could hook that up, too; 'cause chicks dig dudes with money.
Peter Gibbons: Well, not all chicks.
Lawrence: Well, the type of chicks that'd double up on a dude like me do.
Peter Gibbons: Good point.
Lawrence: Well, what about you now? what would you do?
Peter Gibbons: Besides two chicks at the same time?
Lawrence: Well, yeah.
Peter Gibbons: Nothing.
Lawrence: Nothing, huh?
Peter Gibbons: I would relax... I would sit on my ass all day... I would do nothing.
Lawrence: Well, you don't need a million dollars to do nothing, man. Take a look at my cousin: he's broke, don't do shit.

"Hang on a sec, the young'uns are throwin' beer cans at a golf cart."
MB4252 TDS699
killing threads since 2001

[Shotgun 1]

I don't know.... probably pay off the house, make some "safe" investments, put most of it in savings.... I'd probably be a pretty boring lottery winner. But I think I've only bought one lottery ticket in the nine years that I've lived in CA, so my chances of winning are not too high.

[Southern_Man 0]

Free Boogie

"What if there were no hypothetical questions?"

[NWFlyer 2]

Quote

so If YOU won, NWFlyer.. i guess i'd have to ( sadly) leave My wife and Kids,,
and do my best to woo YOU, away from your man,,, so that WE could get married!!!!!

"There is only one basic human right, the right to do as you damn well please. And with it comes the only basic human duty, the duty to take the consequences." -P.J. O'Rourke

[NWFlyer 2]

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First I would have a huge party. I'll be smart about it eventually, but I won't feel too bad about having some fun upfront.

That's what my 5% is for. I don't want to feel like I can't have fun at first, but I also want it to be at least somewhat limited while I really figure things out and figure things out for the long run.

"There is only one basic human right, the right to do as you damn well please. And with it comes the only basic human duty, the duty to take the consequences." -P.J. O'Rourke

[Thanatos340 1]

I would make Brewster look Jewish.

Day 1 - Take 1 Million in cash, Call a few friends, Have a Private Jet waiting to take us to Vegas for the weekend. the objective... Come home with nothing more than we left with but one hell of a weekend.

After that.. Who knows. Already have my dream house planed out completely (Nothing too ridiculous, Total costs should be under 1 million), Just have to find the right place to build it and then spend the next year working as my own general contractor getting it built.

Set up a trust fund for my daughter, Make some conservative investments and hire really good security to keep the "gimmes" away.

[Halfpastniner 0]

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hookers and blow.

Sounds reasonable!

BASE 1384

[JohnMitchell 14]

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resetting the clock on mortgage payments since it is a tax advantage.

I've always disagreed with this. If you have to have a mortgage, it's nice to get something back, but remember, it's 33 cents on the dollar at best. Tell you what, give me that money and I'll give you 50 cents on the dollar back. We paid off all our property and still get the standard deduction of $10+.
Man, if I hit the Lottery? Tell my kids no more having to work through college; what grad school do you want? Tell my job to start my pension 'cause I ain't coming in at 5:30 am again. Hit the boogie circuit with Vskydiver. I'd finally get to meet all y'all peeps. Spend even more time doing the LeapforLupus charity.

Funny thing is I'd still want to do tandems and AFF some, I think. It's never really been just about the money. I enjoy the people.

[CSpenceFLY 1]

I'd be a sorry ass white boy that was missing.

[buff 0]

We only play the lottery on occasion hoping to fund a vacation to NZ.

I'd opt for the annuity payments, pay off the house and buy R a new car. Doubt either of us would quit our jobs.

Definately hit a lot more boogies and wear the finest of all polyester at Freaks.

The rest is a gravy for the retirement.

It's called the Hillbilly Hop N Pop dude.
If you're gonna be stupid, you better be tough.
That's fucked up. Watermelons do not grow on trees! ~Skymama

[Amazon 7]

Quote

The post on the recent lottery win by some British skydivers got me to thinking ... how would you handle a huge windfall? Seems there are a lot of sad stories out there about people who win the lottery and less than a decade later find themselves in worse financial shape than when they started.

Not that I even play, but I'd like to think this would be my approach.

1) Take the lump sum rather than annual payments.

2) Immediately set aside whatever I'd owe in taxes (assuming that amount hadn't already been taken out of the payment I received).

3) Put 95+% in a relatively illiquid low-risk but relatively short-term account ... to force a "cooling off period." Basically, this would lock the money up for 6 months to a year so that I have plenty of time to plot a longer-term strategy for investing, saving, spending, donating, dealing with the parasites that would come out of the woodwork, etc.

THEN I'd figure out what kind of fun to have.

How would you deal with it?

VERY large sailing yacht.... and a few friends to help me sail it around the world... the rest... right into so VERY smart investments to live on.

[billvon 2,380]

1) Put about $1m away as an income fund; make that my "backup" money that would provide me income even if everything else failed.

2) Start a company, Seawanhaka Systems, specializing in power electronics. Specifically aftermarket DC/DC converters for hybrids and electric vehicles, solid state lighting ballasts for theatrical and stage lighting, BMS (battery management systems) for electric vehicles and direct-to-grid solar inverters. Start sales via Internet sales then branch out to small EV/LEV manufacturers and theatrical production companies.

Eventually get into EV systems manufacture, including motor inverters, inductive chargers and control systems.

2) Start a brewery specializing in skydiving themed beers. Get John Campbell down from Montana for six months to help start it. Start with a 20 gallon system, a dozen fermentors, a few bright tanks and a semiautomatic bottler/capper. That would allow a throughput of about 18 cases or 8 corny kegs per day, which would be enough to get our 'feet wet' so to speak. Start with some favorites (a chocolate porter, a wheat, a fruit ale, a clean lager) and then branch out into a few seasonals (sours, barrel aged stouts.) Give a bunch away free to Jump for the Cause, the World Team etc both for fundraising and to get the beer out there.

Eventually move to a 10 barrel system allowing both infusion and decoction mashing and add temp-controlled conical fermentors.

Figure I need about 5 million for all the above, assuming the companies can turn a profit within about 4 years.

[Rstanley0312 0]

Quote

The post on the recent lottery win by some British skydivers got me to thinking ... how would you handle a huge windfall? Seems there are a lot of sad stories out there about people who win the lottery and less than a decade later find themselves in worse financial shape than when they started.

Not that I even play, but I'd like to think this would be my approach.

1) Take the lump sum rather than annual payments.

2) Immediately set aside whatever I'd owe in taxes (assuming that amount hadn't already been taken out of the payment I received).

3) Put 95+% in a relatively illiquid low-risk but relatively short-term account ... to force a "cooling off period." Basically, this would lock the money up for 6 months to a year so that I have plenty of time to plot a longer-term strategy for investing, saving, spending, donating, dealing with the parasites that would come out of the woodwork, etc.

THEN I'd figure out what kind of fun to have.

How would you deal with it?

I would put a lot of the money away... say its a 20 million payout. After taxes I'm looking at 14 mill roughly. So 1.4 to my church, 2.6 to my direct family, 5 mill in investments (my line of work), I would keep my job too. The last 5 mill I would buy a PAC and probably look in to a wind tunnel for my area with the idea this is an investment as well. First step is always... set up a trust and have the money deposited directly in the trust and operate out of said trust.

Life is all about ass....either you're kicking it, kissing it, working it off, or trying to get a piece of it.
Muff Brother #4382 Dudeist Skydiver #000
www.fundraiseadventure.com