An Auckland couple has won a whopping $14.25 million windfall after winning Lotto Powerball's first division prize on Saturday.
The winning ticket was purchased online that morning, using the Lotto app. The winning numbers were 1, 8, 22, 24, 35 and 40. The Bonus ball was 6 and the Powerball was 5.
Asking to remain anonymous, the woman who bought the winning ticket said she'd played the same numbers for a few years: a combination of family birthdays, milestones and special events.
Having bought the ticket on "a bit of a whim", she says she forgot about it until after the draw, when she decided to check her ticket while having dinner with friends.
"My mind started racing when I saw the numbers all being circled on one line - I wanted to tell my husband, but he was deep in conversation, so I started tapping the table to try and get his attention," the woman explained.
After sharing her phone screen with her husband, he nodded, seeing they'd won a bonus ticket. The woman then pointed at the number shown on the top of the ticket, but says her husband didn't fully catch on, thinking they'd won $14,000 instead of $14.25 million.
"...He played it cool as all our friends were around, so I decided to sleep on it and double-check again in the morning," the woman said.
The next morning, she logged back on. Checking her ticket again, she realised their winnings were real.
"I saw all the numbers circled on one line again and it started to feel real - though I've lost track of the number of times I've gone back and looked at the ticket since then."
After sitting her husband down to share the news, he was shocked to discover they'd won much more than $14,000.
"I was still stoked to have won $14,000 - so when she told me to double-check how many zeros there were, I could hardly believe it. There it was right in front of me - we'd won $14,250,000...and a bonus ticket too," he said.
Among the couple's immediate plans are to become mortgage-free and set their children up for the future.
Lotto's next draw is on Wednesday, when a Powerball jackpot prize of $4 million is up for grabs.
