Place your bets, now.
When I saw on the Yahoo news page that an unemployed west Dallas man had won McDonald's $1 Million Monopoly game, I grinned when I saw the following:
The old saw is that, if all the money in the country were distributed evenly among all the people here, within 5 years it would basically have been re-distributed to the same people who have it now. Call me a pessimist, but I actually suspect (without any real (non-anecdotal) evidence) that this is true.
But I chastised myself for having smirked, and thought, "maybe this guy has some good plans for the ~$600k+ that he'll get out of the giant cheque, after taxes." I mean, we all could fall on hard times. We all could find ourselves living with our folks for a few months after a lay-off. We all could end up extending that stay for years. And years. Could happen to any of us.
Now let's see-- he plans to repay his folks. He plans to take his nephew to Yellowstone Park. He plans to... um... get a tattoo of a McRib sammich.
He thinks that properly-utilizing this money, he could be set for life.
Bless his pea-pickin' little heart.
Labels: Awww, celebrity, good luck with that, in the news, lifestyle, rabble
posted by Matt G @ 2:10 PM
10 Comments:
Despite good intentions, if he does not seek professional financial advice, the decks are stacked against him. He will most likely be broke again in a few years. I have alluded to the same. If those with money lose it, it will not be for long, if they have had the ability to gain it once, they will again. Most very wealthy individuals have hit rock bottom at some point and bounced back. The temptation of sex will be this man's downfall...as the gold diggers will want him as long as there is money.
With that creamy complexion, you think he's not used to turning down advances? Come now.
If he is smart, he will do something very safe, like buy an annuity.
There's always the temptation to think that you can use that money to make a lot more money in real estate or the stock market or whatever, but trying to play Gordon Gekko while not knowing what you're doing will leave you just as broke as if you'd blown it on hookers and blow.
Annuities are unsexy, but safe.
I'm in for him going Chapter 7 within 9 months. I knew a kid who came into 650k of insurance money at age 22 who managed to reduce himself to living on a friend's couch within 8 months. His assets by then were a 6 month old Cadillac Eldorado with a destroyed transmission and a 4 month old F350 four wheel drive that had been lifted over 12 inches but hadn't prevented it from spending a week underwater in the river bottom.
Last time I saw him, he had 2 ex-wives and 3 kids, and was riding a bicycle.
I'd sure try to do better if it fell in my lap, though.
Now, now...be nice!
"Creamy complexion"? Ugh. I was looking forward to a nice supper. I'm not hungry now. Thanks, Matt G, I needed to lose weight anyway. :)
WV trebo What de tree do in de wind
I'd bet he's going to be broke before the end of the year... And Tam is correct as far as I'm concerned...
Off topic - but have a very merry Christmas.
Let's assume that he's reasonably competent with money or gets some good advice. That said, if he buys a $150K house,a $25K car, and spends around $25K on other stuff, then he'll have at least $400K to invest. At 6%, which is a safe and moderate return on a mix of quality stocks, bonds, mutuals, CDs, and T-bills, then he'll have $24K a year to live on. Not a fortune, but enough to pay the bills if he's careful. I hope that he's smart enough to get and keep a day job, because living on only $2K a month won't last through many girlfriends, big nights out with the boys, or paying for a fancy new car every time that he wants one. If he had any good sense, I'd recommend that he skip buying a house, rent a nice apartment, and get a useful degree or skill so he can re-start his career plans. Otherwise he'll be broke again in about 10 years.
The best advice I've heard about windfalls like this is research-based. Researchers found that the conventional wisdom is true and people unused to wealth would tend to go through even very large windfalls very quickly because they had no experience managing money in large amounts.
So their advice was to put the money aside in either savings or a very safe investment (yield matters less than safety here) for at least a year, making no lifestyle changes. Some advise blowing a small amount on something you've wanted for a long time first, but the bulk gets set aside while you take your time and figure out what to do.
I have a young friend who was paying the math tax at the ambulance station late one night with scratch-off tickets, and we were ribbing him, but he won $5000 on one of them. I know for sure, because I checked it twice for him. :D He'd been talking about saving up for a down payment on a house so he could move out of his mom's house.
Now it's less than a month later. The money is gone (but the taxes are paid, which is good) and he's got a couple of pieces of dive equipment and another front axle for his mud truck to show for it.
Most of my students tell me they don't need math or history (read: politics) because they're going to be NBA multi-millionaires and I'll just have to watch them on TV. I tell them that you can tell the NBA millionaires who know some math and a little about human nature because they're still millionaires a few years later.
Post a Comment
<< Home