Change your cell phone number, keep your head down and take at least six months before making any major decisions.
That was some of the advice offered by financial advisors who warned that the eventual lucky winners of the record-setting US$1.5 billion US Powerball lottery jackpot should be ready for unexpected stresses. The lottery was scheduled to have been drawn yesterday.
The winnerwill have the option of receiving 30 annual instalments of US$50 million, or a US$930 million lump sum.
But the moneywill set huge expectations for the winner and everyone remotely in his or her social circle, experts said.
“You need to protect yourself,” said James Grubman, a wealth psychologist and author of Strangers in Paradise: How Families Adapt to Wealth Across Generations. “You have to learn how to say no because you're going to have a lot of people who are going to want you to say yes.”
Powerball tickets are sold in 44 US states plus the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico and the US Virgin Islands. Winners are publicly identified in all but five states.
Those lucky enough to defy astronomical odds to win but not lucky enough to live in Delaware, Kansas, Maryland, North Dakota or Ohio, where winners can remain anonymous, should brace for a long list of requests from family, friends and others, experts said.