He spent every penny!
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A guy who won £9.7 million in the lottery yet declared bankruptcy eight years later has given an explanation for how he spent so much money so quickly.
When Michael Carroll won big on a £1 ticket during his first game in November 2002, he received his ticket to fame and money.
The money was meant to last him for the rest of his life, but instead he wasted it all and fell bankrupt in a matter of years.
Michael, who was only 19 years old when he won big, quickly earned reputation in the press as a “Lotto lout” because he didn’t even have a bank account to deposit his earnings in.
He also ended up being a target for those who were willing to use violence to take a piece of his wealth.
In 2006, he admitted to blackmailers threatening his family when he woke up at home to discover his five dogs dead. He also said that on another occasion, guys armed with shotguns showed up at his house.
One of the first things Michael did with his £9.7 million Lotto victory was gift his mother, aunt, and sister a million pounds apiece. This was what he genuinely wanted to spend his money on.
He was kind to do that.
In addition to creating a £3.9 million investment bond, he made a further million investment in his favourite football team, Rangers, and claims to have purchased ‘£150,000 in gold’.
Among his purchases with his Lotto winnings were a £325,000 mansion, which sounds pretty cheap for a house these days, ‘getting on for half a million pounds in holidays’ and a whole fleet of new cars including a new Range Rover, two BMW M3s, a BMW Z4 and three Mitsubishi Evos.
He also revealed that he was ‘spending £2,000 a day just on cocaine’ while also ‘spending about £1,000 a day’ on prostitutes.
By 2010, his spending had blown through his Lotto winnings and he reapplied for his old job as a binman.
Since declaring bankruptcy, Michael has obtained new employment as a coalman in Scotland and is rumoured to have reconnected with his ex-wife Sandra.
Although he earlier stated that he doesn’t regret winning the lotto because it gave him “years of fun for a pound,” he did appear dissatisfied with the Z4, calling it “s**t.
The long queue of friends and family who appear unexpectedly expecting for handouts or with investment ideas is one of the main reasons why many lottery winners wind up bankrupt, like Michael.
If the winner doesn’t receive quite as much money as the large headline sum, it might also be perplexing for them.
Many lottery winners have the option of receiving their winnings as regular payments or as a sizable lump sum, however after taxes, the lump amount can soon become a considerably smaller quantity of money.
Even people who make an effort to avoid spending their profits on a series of expensive purchases may nonetheless run out of money because they choose to have a more expensive lifestyle.
