27-year-old farmer with dreams of buying a home wins big in North Carolina lottery
A North Carolina farmer spent $5 on a lottery ticket — and scored a big jackpot win.
Now, he’s closer to making his dream of buying a new house come true, according to the N.C. Education Lottery.
“I’ve been planning to buy a home and now we have an opportunity to actually do it,” Jose Ponce Rodriguez said June 6 in a news release.
The 27-year-old hit the jackpot after a stop at Mount Olive Mobile & Tobacco, a business roughly 65 miles southeast of Raleigh. That’s where officials said Rodriguez tried his luck on a ticket for the Cash Payout game.
It turns out, his scratch-off won the game’s top prize of $200,000.
“When I saw the prize I just stood for a while looking at it,” Rodriguez said in the release. “I kept saying to myself ‘Is this real?’”
His wife wasn’t convinced that he won at first, either.
“I showed her the ticket when I got home and she just started laughing,” Rodriguez told lottery officials. “She couldn’t believe it was really true.”
But the prize was the real deal, and the husband kept $142,021 after taxes. Rodriguez, who lives in the Wayne County community of Dudley, plans to help relatives in addition to buying a new home.
It’s not the first time a lottery winner has considered spending money on a place to live.
In May, officials said a couple paid off their house after getting richer from the South Carolina lottery.
And in 2021, another South Carolina player considered buying a home soon after his “surreal” win, McClatchy News reported.
BEHIND THE STORY
MOREWhen gambling is more than a game
Gambling is designed to be a source of entertainment.
If you or a loved one shows signs of gambling addiction, you can seek help by calling the national gambling hotline at 1-800-522-4700 or visiting the National Council on Problem Gambling website.
This story was originally published June 6, 2022 at 3:27 PM with the headline "27-year-old farmer with dreams of buying a home wins big in North Carolina lottery."
