NEED TO KNOW
- A California couple won big after 20 years of playing the lottery
- “It was just, like, you know, just what the heck?!” winner Nicholas Gercis said
- He and his wife plan to use their winnings in three different ways
Patience is a virtue.
A California couple scored big after two decades of trying their luck on the lottery, according to a news release from state game officials.
Nicholas Gercis and his wife have been longtime gamblers, playing the lottery for 20 years. “We buy Scratchers every week, and we started buying these 50X ones, and it was doing okay for us,” he said in a statement.
After a few wins throughout the years — of “$100 and stuff” — Gercis said he and his wife recently played a 50X the Cash scratcher, which has a top prize of $1 million, and won. (The California lottery told PEOPLE the pair won the full amount, minus the required federal tax withholding, as a lump sum.)
“It was just, like, you know, just what the heck?!” said Gercis after he and his wife won, according to California lottery officials
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Gercis and his wife bought their winning lottery ticket at a 7-Eleven on Schleisman Road in Eastvale, which is just under 50 miles away from Los Angeles.
Lottery officials said the couple would go to “one of a few 7-Eleven stores in their area each week and buy some scratchers for fun.”
Gercis and his wife plan to use the money won in three ways: some will go to paying off their house, another amount will go to their church, and they will then invest the rest.
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Over the past 40 years, the California Lottery has funded public education within the state through every lottery win.
“Raising extra money for California public education is the only reason the California Lottery exists,” Carolyn Becker, spokesperson for the organization, said in a statement. “In 1984, voters created the Lottery to help out with supplemental funding for Schools, and for 40 years, players have provided more than $46 billion in extra money used across all levels from kindergarten through university.”
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