If you’re lucky enough to win a jackpot lottery, you have many decisions to make. While it’s definitely a thrill to win, it’s also a responsibility to be careful. You’ll need to protect your prize, and a few tips can help you to stay on top of it all.
There are two ways to claim a winning Powerball or Mega Millions jackpot: either by taking the lump sum or by receiving it as an annuity. The latter is a more secure method of claiming a big prize. When you receive your annuity, you’ll continue to make payments for years to come, and even if you die before you receive all of them, your family will get a portion of your payout.
In the past, you might have seen the same thing. But in the age of the Internet, there are now online lottery courier services that can send your ticket from one state to another. This is a new way to win big, but you’ll need to plan ahead.
There are actually a number of reasons that you might want to keep your winnings anonymous. For example, there are people out there who will try to scam you out of your money. Keeping your name out of the public eye will ensure that you aren’t ripped off.
A winning Powerball or Mega Millions ticket can be purchased in more than 45 states, including Puerto Rico. However, the odds of claiming a jackpot are a little slimmer than the odds of winning the Super Bowl. It takes five numbers between 1 and 70 to win the jackpot, and you’ll only get a prize if you can match all of them.
As you might imagine, the best way to guarantee that you’ll have a nice lump sum to spend on things like a new car or a trip to Hawaii is to plan carefully. And by planning carefully, you might be able to get a bigger lump sum than you might have thought possible.
In the past few weeks, a single ticket in South Carolina claimed the largest jackpot in the history of the game. But a slew of other drawings have been held without a winner. Some of these, like the $1.25 billion jackpot, have been surpassed by other larger prizes.
The chances of a person winning a jackpot is about as high as the odds of a cab driver winning the lottery. In fact, one study found that the chance of a person winning the Powerball was one in 292.2 million.
But the chance of a person winning the jackpot hasn’t always been that low. Before Mega Millions was rolled out, there were several other larger jackpots that were harder to win.
However, in the last few years, the odds of a person winning a jackpot have improved, thanks in part to rising interest rates. Those rising rates have fueled a surge in the size of the jackpots. Since 2012, the average Powerball jackpot has increased from about $95 million to about $141 million.