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I'm guessing that nobody here won the lottery, but if you did win a $1.6 billion jackpot ($900m+ after taxes), what would you do with it?

Tell no one I had it. Seriously. Then I'd probably save some of it and live a little better.

There's a classic reddit post on this topic:

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/24vzgl/you_just_won_a_656_million_dollar_lottery_what_do/chba4bf/

Despite this recent lottery being higher, I think the advice there still holds true: keep this information private if possible (as North said), don't let others take advantage of your generosity, and invest wisely.

My father always said he would make an LLC (or trust or something, it's been a while since I've been around my father long enough to talk to him about this) and put a handful of people that aren't directly connected to him (but he would still trust) on the board, and have them handle the money. He said the reason for this was simple, even if people did find out he wouldn't have the money and couldn't get it by hurting him or his family.

I'd buy a house, use the rest for bills, grocery shopping and my future wedding, then I'd still work a job anyways. All the money from work would be for excess stuff like games, a computer and relationship things such as gifts.

A billion dollars give or take, huh? I really don't know what I would do with it. You would make literal fortunes off interest but at that point, I don't think it would even matter. I guess I would have to go with Chanku's father's idea, set up a company and transfer a good chunk of the money there and try to keep it as secret as possible. I'd keep a reasonable amount for myself, maybe $50-100 million, that way I could live off the interest fairly comfortably should I choose to do so.

I'd want the company to invest and manage the money, paying dividends to the appropriate people and stuff. I think the company should work on funding charities, holding competitions and providing for the world. I'd want to try to create an education system of my own, here in Canada, catering to the individual needs of students and being entirely based on a lottery system for those who are most disadvantaged in society. I'd try to be secretive, our headquarters being somewhere quiet, maybe a floor on a low-rise here in Mississauga. On second thought, maybe it should be broken up into multiple companies. Honestly, I don't think it's worth putting that much thought into at this point. Suffice it to say, I'd want to change the world for the better but I'd like to be private, still able to walk down the street without having to worry, or having to worry about the people I choose to befriend

Purchasing some safe property in a guarded neighborhood wouldn't be a bad idea, keep it around should it be needed, under the company's name, if else purchase it myself and use my personal investments to pay for it. I'd move out into a place of my own and renovate it so that it fits me and my tastes and needs or maybe a modest apartment in Toronto? Hell, I could buy the building. I would go visit my girlfriend and spend time with her. I'd be able to provide for her and sweep her off her feet... It's something I want beyond a doubt, regardless of if I won or not and the money would provide me the ability to do that.

I'd stay in school as long as I wanted, start a business, build my name as a person aside from my wealth.

I'm half tempted to give it all away now that I've read what I've written... It all feels worthless... I mean, all of this stuff I could accomplish on a whim. Ideas, goals, projects and other things I would have to slave over today, simply solved with a liberal application of money. My journey as a person would be over, I think or be changed so much that I wouldn't even know at that point. I wouldn't have earned it and therefore it and anything associated with it would have no value or significantly diminished value.

I do have plans on how I would spend a million dollars, however, a plan I think would be more worthwhile than a billion.

I guess I'm in a very philosophical mood lol.

First I would be a nintendo switch a cd player and all of green day's albums

For 1.6 billion I think I could provide housing for all the homeless in Scotland.

I think I would also buy every current switch game on the market then buy an ollie king and crazy taxi 3 arcade board and mod it to work with an xbox remote

First I would be a nintendo switch a cd player and all of green day's albums

Hmm......me, early on, I’d bank all but 50 million dollars for interest, then live a nice “middle station of life” life, taking from Robinson Crusoe’s father’s advice.

I don’t care much for fancy things honestly.

I’d keep it secret however, and keep a job and college both for appearances, and to keep myself busy. I’d retire, and maybe get into a few expensive hobbies, before dying and bequeathing my wealth not to my family but to libraries, cancer research, and multitudinous other charities and institutions.

Well, first I'd pay off my student loans and dental bill so that I could be debt free.

Then I'd buy myself a car or a motorcycle so that I could get around faster and start traveling more.

I'd put a sizeable amount in the bank so that I had some fallback money, and I'd give a portion to my parents to pay them back for all of the times they've ever paid for something or given me money for something.

I'd quit my job and go back to school, going for an arts degree and improve my singing voice as well, and maybe learn Italian fluently while I'm at it.

Finally, I'd buy myself a modestly sized house with a studio, and live my days pursing my passion of writing and video games without worry of financial troubles, and possibly pursue an actual love in my life to share the moments with since i won't be confined by financial shackles.

I'm with Pengu. Pay off my debts first and foremost.

Then I'd probably invest some of it in this game because I'm a selfish nerd and this is my baby.

I'd probably donate a  portion to the shelter I used to work at. Those dogs deserve so much more.

Then savings and investment for myself. Money made from that would be used to fund random kickstarters and crowdfunding projects.

Aha!  Didn't see this thread the first time around apparently! 

Yes as far as scale goes, assuming you've got now ~$900 million after taxes.  So you have to go with the $600 million instant option I think, because if you do the whole payment installment thing you don't get nearly as much interest as you would if you just dumped the $600 million into random stock market things. 

So assuming I have $600ish million, I would first earmark approximately $100 million for immediate expenditure (boat, helicopter, and other things necessary to LARP as an evil mastermind) and then probably take the other $500 million and spend it on a really mundane business (think toilet paper factory or similar.  Basically consumer staples.)  Alternatively diversified investments, but I think that would be a bit more risky in terms of losing money.  Toilet paper is one thing people don't purchase less of when the economy goes downhill. 

Oh but definitely nothing about winning the lottery.  I just had a really lucky penny stock, or bitcoin or whatever.  People should be less liable to ask for things if you do that.  Also if they ask what you did with the money and you reply "I decided to corner the toilet paper industry" that would probably be unglamorous enough for them not to ask for money.  If they still did you could probably just tell them to scram or drop it, I guess.

Spend it on copies of jet set radio future

I'm from Finland, so I'll be having the full 1.6 billion. No taxes on such things here, hooray! Although that much money really throws out any significant need to maintain modesty, I could spend two million a month and still not risk running out of money in my lifetime. I'm also very unlikely to ever end up with kids, so there's little need to go into that "would giving them money ruin their lives too?" Perhaps I'd have my remaining fortune converted to gold, and arrange a burial spot for myself in those tunnels we're digging for nuclear waste. That'd put a fun twist into everything involved.

I'd hire someone to bully me into decent physical shape, it'll take a while to spend that much money, so better put some into extending that life expectancy! I'm lumping everything similar with this, some work on my teeth, chats with therapist, courses "how to prevent myself from buying a Mercedes and driving like an a-hole" etc. I think I have some personal and commercial debts too.

I'd buy a house, I like my personal space. Not too big, so I wouldn't end up, at least outright, just hiring someone to take care of it. It's not really very personal space if I have to have people running around a lot. Multiple floors (two above and one under, possibly on a hill that exposes different amount of the house to natural light depending on the side of the house. Brick cladding, metal roof, and electric heating for simplicity, longevity and minimal maintenance. Preferably next to a forest, so the amount of yard I'd end up with wouldn't be full extent of my access to peaceful outdoors.

New daily driver, very likely a Volvo. I haven't looked into anything too new of theirs in depth, but I'm sure they're still very sensible and built to be enjoyed. I'd likely end up with a few project cars as well, so might as well add a good garage to the house. probably a space for DD directly in the house, and separate, bigger garage for the rest.

My stock answer for the first thing I'd buy has for years been "garbage bags". I think I'd still go with that, there's enough depth for my liking. Buying something not just to throw it away, but to be able to throw a bunch of other stuff away as well, is an odd detail of modern life. The answer also comes with an implication that I have a lot to throw away/I'd throw everything old away, and while my ability to actually throw anything out is minuscule, it's still a fun thought.

I'd offer one old friend a free apartment, and probably a decent lump of money since I'd be swimming in it, but I suspect she'd know better than devaluing a life with too much free money. Housing on the other hand is something we talked about as teens, and it's relatively modest improvement for an individual's life to avoid at least the bulk of the issues straightforward cash tends to cause. We're no longer talking, so this would just be a one time "Do you remember --? Do you want --? Have a good day/You're welcome."

Next I'd figure out the feasibility of owning rental housing and a business or two. Not to make money, but to put some money into an active, good use. I don't have the skills to start any kind of business, hence "owning" instead of "starting", they'd be managed by competent people, I'd just mandate some guiding policies. Goal with these would simply be to provide at least a handful of people a little better lives, through their own work or by having a reliable roof on top (we have decent welfare programs, but rents are so brutal). Business would of course have to be managed more carefully, as it'd preferably need to be profitable enough to stay feasible after I die to let people carry on with their careers.

Starting a bus company would be very tempting. We're already having pretty decent competition, but the company I loved was sold a while back, and the new owner of course raised prices. What I'd do is sell every ticket as a double by default, aka the seat next to you would be guaranteed to be empty. Bring a friend for free or just enjoy the space (very Nordic, yes). This would very likely be completely unsustainable, but it might still be a fun thing to keep going for a limited time, and I'm sure at least a few people would really appreciate it. Disrupting the job market might of course cause some havoc, but I suspect that "bus driver" isn't the steadiest profession these days anyway.

I'd love to buy ArenaNet/Guild Wars IP. I think a lot of potential is being wasted there, and uncertainty/distrust keeps harming the games. GW2 is profitable, but you know how big companies are, they always want more. I'd first of all figure out how much it costs to keep the game running with good capacity margins and set aside the money for 10-20 years, creating a guarantee that the game at least lives on if things otherwise go wrong. Content development would get extra layers: I'd hire some people to figure out the long lost first Living World Season, and some to further develop old maps (they have completely unused, inaccessible space on top of just having space to receive new little things), and various neglected game modes. At the same time I'd have a separate team start working on a modernised, rebuilt GW2.1: same game, but either serious revamp under the hood, or a new engine altogether (while I love any excuse to upgrade my PC, the general consensus seems to be that games should instead just run better).

There really is so much fun you could do with such huge heaps of money, I'd have to hire some people to make sure I wouldn't end up causing too much harm to the society. It'd be so easy for example to go and donate a bunch to a cat shelter, but who knows what that could cause (probably a person with access to their finances disappearing with the money, but there could be funnier (...or more tragic) scenarios too). I might turn into a supervillain of micromanagement, or just figure out I can sit home doing nothing in particular all day, every day, for decades.