Wednesday, March 28, 2012

Delusional Daydream 2: What If i Won This Lottery

i was wondering what i would do if i won the MegaMillions jackpot on Friday March 30th.  For those of you outside the US, MegaMillions is a lottery (kind of like a national lottery).  The jackpot is currently at a record $500 million (or $.5 Billion if you prefer).  The cash option is currently $359.4 million (before taxes).


Sometimes it is nice to tune out the world and have a delusion, like what would you do if you won the lottery.  It is a nice daydream - the problems with daydreams/dreams is that you almost always wake up or the dream ends).  It is fun to think about (but large jackpots have mind-bending logisitcs).  i guess that is a good problem to have.  If a blog pops up on Blogger eventually titled "Diary of a Lottery Winner (Fictional)," then maybe the dream hasn't ended.  Maybe i have thought about this a little too much...

Dream Scenario 1: Sole Jackpot 
i view this as extrememly unlikely (i figure that this will probably be split 4+ ways) - well more extremely unlikely than winning the jackpot itself.  That would net me approximately $255 million after taxes (estimated 25% federal, 4% state).  Assuming everyone would let me do what i want, what would i do with this money?...
* Fun Money: $250,000:  To spend on "toys" (video games, computers, tvs, arcade machines, pinball tables, etc)
* Ego Project/Company:  $50-125 million (yep that much): one idea would be to resurrect Game Room (video game on XBL).  Instead of licensing the content, i think it would be cool to purchase this retro IP (maybe even some companies/developers - like Taito and the rights to Midway retro titles).  It might also be fun to buy rights to TV shows/Movies too. Maybe this would involve setting up my own company.   
* Professional Sports Ownership: i was thinking 10% ownership interest in an NHL team (maybe one that rhymes with Smedators, probably about $17 million).  i don't like the NHL so why an NHL team?  They have the lowest priced franchises.  It would be kind of cool to buy 5-10% interest in the Seattle Mariners too ($30-60 million)
* Boring Stuff: This would be stuff like houses, property, stocks & bonds, CDs, silver & gold & platinum ($25 million or so)
* Yearly Stipend: $100,000 a year for 50 years (5 million)
* Other: Charities, donations, or just miscellaneous things. (5 million) 
* That would leave about $15 or so million

Unlikely, Likely Scenario: Split
So if there was a 4-way split (and i was one of them), how would that change things?  Well, the $255 million would be divided by 4 (about $63 million).  If it were 2 or the the breakdown would be $127.5 / 85 million ... so i would have to hold back a little.  In the above scenario i "spent about $240 million).  In this scenario i assume a 4 way split.
* Fun Money: stays the same or halved
* Ego Project: gets downscaled significantly, maybe to $10 million
* Professional Sports Ownership: gets cut out (could add if only two way split)
* Yearly Stipend: Stays the same
* Boring Stuff: Maybe more money shifts into this
* Others: Maybe a couple million for charities, misc (just less

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