Winner will take the full annuity payout
The owner of a winning $42 million Mega Millions ticket, sold at a Macomb County, Michigan, liquor store, is expected to show up at Lottery headquarters Friday to collect the fortune.
Lottery officials are being tight-lipped about the winner's identity, and won't even disclose if it's a man or a woman. The mystery person or persons will be revealed Friday at a news conference.
The winner may do something almost unheard of: receive the money in installments rather than getting a smaller, one-time cash payment. The lump-sum payment in this case would be $26.3 million, after state and local taxes are deducted.
State lottery spokeswoman Andi Brancato says she can't remember a Mega Millions winner in Michigan ever doing that since the game was launched in 2002.
It marks the eighth time a Michigan resident has won the jackpot in the Mega Millions since the game was launched in 2002. The biggest jackpot collected by a Michigan player came in April of 2005 when Mary and Ralph Stebbins of Port Huron won a $208 million prize.
The winning numbers in last Friday's drawing were 13, 28, 32, 41 and 52. The Mega Ball was 16.
The $42 million winning ticket was purchased at the Stoney Creek Liquor Shoppe on Van Dyke Road in Washington Township.
Mega Millions tickets are sold in 12 states.
"The winner may do something almost unheard of: receive the money in installments rather than getting a smaller, one-time cash payment. The lump-sum payment in this case would be $26.3 million, after state and local taxes are deducted."
Could turn into a wise plan. About $1.4 million a year is cool. WTG!
All I know is it wasn't me.
I live about 10 miles from the place!!
I wouldn't choose an annuity payment, especially the way the economy is. But I wasn't the winner, so I guess it really doesn't matter.
Ordinairly I'd agree with you,but the way the economy is today,and I was younger,I think I'd take the annuity.I'd let the Mega Millions Lottery figure out how to invest the money and just send me a check every year.
good point.
On the other hand,who knows if the Mega Millions Lottery will make good investments?They could go broke by making bad investments and file for bankruptcy,leaving lottery winners that chose to take an annuity holding an empty bag.
The lotteries invest in government securities, which are as safe as can be. Even if the lottery itself could go bankrupt, the government will make the payments. Afterall, they can print as much money as they want to. The only question is what your payments will really be worth. If things got bad enough that the government printed money just to pay their debt the real value of the payments would decline slightly. Of course in that case, almost any investment would be worth far less.
Personally, I suspect that now might be a very good tme to take the cash. Somewhere between opening bell on Monday and, say, next September, there are going to be some great opportunities to buy stocks for far less than their real worth. Or a great chance to buy stocks cheaply right before we really do go down the tubes.
"The lump-sum payment in this case would be $26.3 million, after state and local taxes are deducted."
Anyone doubting this information? 26.3 mil sounds like the amount won BEFORE applicable taxes.
It is, it should be about 18.5M after the initial taxes. A smaller amount might be easier to manage but of course they're going to be paying state and federal taxes every year on it with the annuity and I'm sure those taxes will be going up, possibly by a significant margin.