Richard Lustig was an American man who came to prominence for winning relatively large prizes in seven state-sponsored
lottery
A lottery is a form of gambling that involves the drawing of numbers at random for a prize. Some governments outlaw lotteries, while others endorse it to the extent of organizing a national or state lottery. It is common to find some degree of ...
games from 1993 to 2010. His prizes totaled over $1 million. He wrote ''Learn How To Increase Your Chances of Winning the Lottery''.
Life
Lustig lived in
Orlando
Orlando () is a city in the U.S. state of Florida and is the county seat of Orange County. In Central Florida, it is the center of the Orlando metropolitan area, which had a population of 2,509,831, according to U.S. Census Bureau figures rele ...
,
Florida
Florida is a state located in the Southeastern region of the United States. Florida is bordered to the west by the Gulf of Mexico, to the northwest by Alabama, to the north by Georgia, to the east by the Bahamas and Atlantic Ocean, and to ...
, where he had a career as an entertainment booking agent. He died in 2018 at age 67.
Publicity
Lustig's seven lottery wins has been featured on the financial web site
CNN Money
CNN Business (formerly CNN Money) is a financial news and information website, operated by CNN. The website was originally formed as a joint venture between CNN.com and Time Warner's ''Fortune'' and ''Money'' magazines. Since the spin-off of Time ...
.
His book ''Learn How to Increase Your Chances of Winning the Lottery'' was ranked #3 on
Amazon's self-help book list in 2013.
In an interview with
ABC News
ABC News is the news division of the American broadcast network ABC. Its flagship program is the daily evening newscast ''ABC World News Tonight, ABC World News Tonight with David Muir''; other programs include Breakfast television, morning ...
, Lustig explained that his method is to re-invest all of his winnings back into the lottery.
He also recommends using hand-picked sequential numbers and using the same numbers repeatedly.
Personal finance author Zac Bissonnette has characterized Richard Lustig's recommendations as "dangerous",
further noting the odds of winning any lotto prize are low and Lustig's advice to play sequential numbers is statistically inferior to selecting random numbers for each drawing. Financial journalist
Felix Salmon
Felix Salmon (born 1972) is a financial journalist, formerly of ''Portfolio Magazine'' and ''Euromoney'' and a former finance blogger for Reuters, where he analyzed economic and occasionally social issues in addition to financial commentary. In Apr ...
wrote that given Lustig's habit of using much of his winnings to buy more lotto tickets, it is unclear if he has kept more in prize money than he spent on lotto tickets: "
ustignever actually comes out and says that he’s a net winner."
CNN Money took their video down after a "firestorm of criticism."
Wins
Lustig's total wins amount to a value of $1,052,205.58
(before taxes). Two of those wins were holidays rather than cash prizes, valued at $8,560.66 total. His first win was in 1993, and the last one in 2010:
* Win 1: $10,000 – January 1993 (scratch-off ticket)
* Win 2: $13,696.03 – August 1997 (Florida Fantasy 5)
* Win 3: "Wheel of Fortune" Holiday trip to Los Angeles – June 2000 (valued at $3,594.66) (scratch-off ticket "2nd chance drawing")
* Win 4: Elvis Holiday trip to Memphis – October 2001 (valued at $4,966) (scratch-off ticket "2nd chance drawing")
* Win 5: $842,152.91 – January 2002 (Florida Mega Money)
* Win 6: $73,658.06 – November 25, 2008 (Florida Fantasy 5)
* Win 7: $98,992.92 – August 9, 2010 (Florida Fantasy 5)
References
External links
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Lustig, Richard
People from Orlando, Florida
Lottery winners
Year of birth missing
2018 deaths
Date of birth missing