Yep. Win the lottery, you are fucked. The following is all half-remembered from a Reddit thread a while back, but it’s good advice (if I find the thread again I’ll link it).
This is why you CONTACT A LAWYER. A lawyer from a LARGE, NATIONAL FIRM, no juniors or associates, you want a full-blown partner. Don’t use anyone local or anything. You want somebody who has no clue who you are, and somebody who works in ‘Trusts and Estates’.
Play dress-up when you go to collect your money if there is any possibility of photographs. Been wanting to change your hair drastically? DO IT AFTER. Now is the time for all that foundation that doesn’t match and the makeup you hate! Wear the stupid hat that makes you look like a flower pot! Wear the clothes that make you look like you have a totally different body shape! Grow the douchebeard! Just change what you look like. You don’t want to be recognized. There was a lottery winner who was forced away from his favorite eating spot because financial stalkers would lurk and demand cash or ‘suggest’ ways to spend his money, and these weren’t people interested in job interviews or anything. When he had to stop going there, they figured out where he lived and started intimidating and accosting family members.
See if you can get them to write your name differently if there’s a giant cheque, too. Instead of Alyn Tony Jones or something, see if they’ll just put A. T. Jones. Now, I’m fucked because my last name is pretty unique, but you might not be!
Collect your prize in a locale that is as far away from your home area as possible. By this point, you should have already made your plans for all of this shit and where the money is going, read ahead for that. Then? Vanish. For a month. Take a cruise or just take off in your car or go rent a beachfront. Roleplay Carmen Sandiego or Where’s Waldo. Wait for everyone to calm their tits.
Take the lump sum. You take a tax hit but you also have access to all the cash, and no, you won’t be beating inflation somehow by taking the annuity.
Decide, RIGHT FUCKING NOW, how much you are going to give to your family and friends. Inform your lawyer of that amount. Don’t talk to your family about this or you get into endless arguments over how much you gave to who, and who influenced you to do that, which– no joke– may result in a lawsuit. Because people are greedy, ignorant, and sue-happy.
Worth noting. Do not buy them sweet fuck all, and do not under any circumstances hand out cash (you will never be able to stop without being labeled a stingy bitch). No houses. No cars. Set up trusts. These trusts should not total more than 15-20% of your new worth. Then dictate what they can do with that trust. Higher education? Sure! Down payment for a house? Eh… should they be buying a house if they can’t even afford the down payment without help? It’s another thing entirely if something in the house that wasn’t their fault catastrophically failed. You’ve already set up a trust for them that is massively generous.
Put like 30% of your cash in a Swiss bank account and buy some municipal bonds, Swiss bonds, an S&P 500 doodah. These are your safety nets. Unless the world economy gets drop-kicked into the toilet, you are now taken care of for life solely off of these. So you could go nuts on whatever remains and buy eight thousand spinning wheels or something. With your lawyer (LAWYER) you should be protected from most lawsuits, and the trusts ensure your family is taken care of because those trusts cannot be touched. However, don’t put all your money in these– invest in some real estate, stocks and bonds, whatever. But learn about it all and figure out how this shit works. Do not sign ANYTHING until you understand exactly what is going on, and ask every stupid question before signing and get second opinions. You do not want to be snookered out of your cash.
So. You should also have: changed your phone numbers to unlisted ones, gotten a PO box and immediately switched all mail delivery to the PO box. Shred any mail that turns up that is not from somebody you know.
This is all half-remembered from some Reddit thread back when everyone was flipping their shit over that 600mil lottery.
