For the record, I’ve never won big at Powerball and neither has anybody I know. We’ve never been invited around for a lavish BBQ in a house won by Powerball (or won by anything really) nor have I come to work and found a co-workers banged up Toyota Corolla has suddenly been replaced by a Bugatti Veyron in Italian Red in the staff carpark.
Still, I will be buying a ticket in this week’s 150 million dollar draw…along with just about half the country it seems.
Quick edit: It didn’t go off. Nobody won the 150m Powerball and at the time of writing it’s hit record highs of $200 million aussie dolleredoos.
‘Should we buy a Powerball ticket this week? It’s up to 150 million.’ – Wifey
Isn’t it ironic that more people will buy a Powerball ticket when it gets to insane amounts of money than they will when it’s just a couple of million dollars on the prize table. ‘3 mil? Pfft! Wake me up when it’s over $100 thanks!’ As if a handful of millions nowadays just doesn’t have the same shine to it as it did once upon a time (although if house prices continue to rise as they are..)
Where we live the median house price is a pretty decent $867,500 (don’t worry, there’s plenty more on either side of that score.) Which means even a paltry one million dollar Powerball victory would be more than enough money to move into something comfy and even better completely paid off.
(Otherwise that 867K looks more like 1.97 million in the banks pocket by the time the loan is paid off over 30 years provided you don’t chip at it.)
Two million is the house bought and paid, rates good for practically forever and plenty of shares for the kids to set them up for life. (This is if we buy here, 2 million dollars in Sydney might only get you a one bedroom near some water at the moment.)
Three million in a Powerball win? Well then and only then would I consider all of the above and the cleanest third generation Mazda Rx7 I could find, now that I could finally afford to keep up with the maintenance.
The thrilling part for me I think would be looking at my pay packet each fortnight (until I work out when I want to quit) and then not watching half of it disappear into rent and bills within hours. That’s the dream right there and that hideously low million or three would do it nicely!
Although 150 million in Powerball is a lot of money..
Agreed. Staggeringly so. But you’ve got to remember that they higher the jackpot, the more people jump on board and buy a ticket and ergo – the more chance you might have to share your division one with someone else. Still, if ten people manage to crack this one (possibly a syndicate, maybe just through pure luck) then that’s still a life changing 15 million dollars coming at you.
(Maybe not so life changing for someone like Gina Reinhardt but it certainly would be for the average blogger like my good self.)
Even 100 winners would be grinning. Unless they live in Sydney.
Closest I’ve come? About 40 bucks from memory once which paid off my ticket and bought me a coffee. I can’t recall what prize division that was (2nd last?) but I was pretty chuffed with it. If I can’t win millions in Powerball than a free drink will have to do and maybe some cake if I really win big (if only I’d won this level of coin back in the mid 90’s though, I would feel like a millionaire..)
But hey, maybe this week will be my week? It’s been an interesting enough start to the year already, a little luck our way certainly wouldn’t go astray..
Letting the machine do the heavy lifting
The last time I picked numbers for anything was new years eve when I was having dinner with the in laws at the Boomerang pub and I announced that I was going to play Keno, so how about everyone give me a birthday number and we’d go from there? Well wasn’t that a disaster! Suddenly I had 53 numbers flying at me from all angles including for aunts and uncles I’d never even met when I needed 20 at most. So I culled the list down to about 20 or so and watched my 10 buck ticket win 7. Then my 7 buck ticket won 4. The 4 of course got whittled down to 1 and nothing happened at all with the 1.
So like my Powerball tickets, next time I’m going to leave the machine to quick pick the numbers for me. I’ve never looked inside a quick pick machine myself but I can only assume the operator looks something like this.
Although if you believe in the power of numbers (and not so much in random probability)
Then you’ll love these stats I’ve pulled from the official site.
Since April 19, 2018:
The luckiest Powerball number is tied between numbers 2 and 19 (21 times each)
The unluckiest Powerball number is 14 (it’s only been drawn 8 times)
17 (my wife and I’s lucky number – we’re both born in the 17th) is one of the most frequent winning numbers, coming up a staggering 77 times now. (There was a 17 in last weeks draw!)
15 and 33 are the opposite to that, fronting up a mere 51 times.
So will I be buying a Powerball ticket?
Sure, why not. My rents going up next month and the kids need some new school uniforms. A cheeky million or 150 should take care of that pretty much…
Update: Now that it’s a 200 million Powerball, an extra 50 million certainly wouldn’t go astray.
(Good luck if you’re playing too!)