This story seems to resurface every once in a while – but Joan Ginther really is a lottery winner four times over. Although the most recent win was way back in 2010. But it’s still pretty impressive, even over the space of 17 years of playing.
Joan Ginther’s Lottery Wins
Here’s a list of Joan’s winnings:-
- 1993 – $5.4 Million (Texas Lotto)
- 2006 – $2 Million (Holiday Millionaire scratch off)
- 2008 – $3 Million (Millions and Millions scratch off)
- 2010 – $10 Million (Extreme Payout scratch off)
Although finding any of those tricky hard facts about Joan’s wins is nigh on impossible.
“Maths Professor Beats The Lottery”
We do know that Joan Ginther is a maths professor from Texas. Which is the very thing that has a habit of generating lots of conspiracy theories about how she could be ‘beating the system’.
The more likely explanation however is that Joan was lucky, particularly the first time.
But then with $5.4 Million in winnings behind her, that leaves quite a lot of loose change to buy a lot more lottery tickets.
And what does a lot more lottery tickets do to your chances of winning again? It sends them through the roof.
So How Did She Do It
Which brings us to the key fact that we don’t know about Joan’s playing habits.
How much did she spend on tickets?
She may have spent 10’s or even 100’s of thousands of dollars on tickets. Maybe even more.
It’s also likely that she chose her games carefully.
Lottery Tactics You Can Copy
The last 3 of her 4 wins came from playing scratch off tickets. So she probably picked the games with the best chance of winning big prizes. And used that big budget when all the big prizes were still available.
Which is not really rocket science – or complicated Professor level stuff maths either.
Now you may not have Joan’s budget, but don’t neglect that tactic if you play scratch off games.
Check the lottery companies website before you buy, and find out which scratch off games have the best odds, and which have all of their big prizes remaining.
After all, why buy tickets for games where most of the big prizes have already been won?
Your Comments ↓
I mean, “anyone” can count cards too, but it helps to be able to do it WELL…it seems she has mastered the lottery art. I am inspired, but know damn well that I could never do it.
I want to win lotto in Ghana and I need your help. Ghana lotto is full of calculation.
I’m afraid no amount of calculations will help you win, as you can’t predict or ‘calculate’ a lottery game. Buying more tickets will increase your chances of winning, and playing in a lottery syndicate will do that without the cost. Good luck 🙂
Looks like we were right all along – as Philly.com’s investigation now reveals… Joan was lucky the first time, then simply spent a fortune to win more. There’s a bit more to it than that – she simply did her numbers and worked out the risk, likely returns, tax breaks on losers etc.