In no particular order, here are some of the biggest unclaimed lottery tickets!
9 - $14.6 Million Arizona has had quite some
history with big unclaimed lottery prizes. From 1999 to 2018, the biggest unclaimed win stood at
$4 million dollars. But that was obliterated with an unclaimed ticket worth $14.6 million
that expired in December of 2019! According to the Arizona Lottery,
the winning ticket for The Pick game was bought on June 5th, 2019, in downtown Phoenix. The 180-day
period to claim the prize expired on December 2nd with no one turning up to cash in on the golden
ticket. Obviously it sucks for whoever bought the winning ticket, but on the flip side,
the cash was still useful in other ways. In Arizona specifically, the unclaimed jackpot
is split among different social initiatives in the state. For example, here’s how that $14.6
million dollars was divided. A maximum of $835,000 thousand dollars was sent to the Internet Crimes
Against Children program. 30% was sent to Court Appointed Special Advocates, a group of volunteers
who provide legal representation for kids that need it. $250,000 thousand dollars went to the
Dual Tribal Enrollment Fund. This targets high school level Native Americans and assists them
with funding for access to a college education. And finally, the remaining amount was injected
back into the prize pool for the future winners! 14.4 Million is a lot of money. But it’s not as
much as one current unclaimed ticket for hundreds of millions we’ll be discussing
later in the video! 8 - $16.6 Million
It looks like it’s a thing for people to forget or lose a Powerball ticket they bought. This
unclaimed 16.6 million dollar jackpot isn’t the only unclaimed powerball ticket on this list.This
first unclaimed Powerball jackpot was back in 2013. Three people each from different states
were lucky enough to land the winning tickets in May of that year. The $50 million dollar prize was
split three ways with each of them getting just a little over $16 and a half million.
The winners from Louisiana and Delaware claimed their share but the third winning
ticket holder from Florida never showed up! That Florida ticket was purchased at a
convenience store in Tampa. Whoever bought the ticket didn’t turn it in time within the allowed
6-month period to claim the ticket. So in November that year, with the waiting
period over, the $16.6 million became the largest ever unclaimed Powerball jackpot in Florida.
A big part of the prize, roughly 80% of it was put in the Educational Enhancement Trust Fund as
per the Floridian law. Money in this trust fund is used in a wide array of education-related
initiatives, such as school construction and scholarships. The rest of the prize money was put
back into the lottery. 7 - £64 million
This is easily one of the largest unclaimed lottery prizes
ever! 64 million pounds converts to about $88 and a half million in 2021 dollars. Just
like the $50 million dollar Powerball jackpot we just talked about, this was also a shared prize.
One of the winning tickets was bought in England while the other one was bought
in Belgium. But when the winners were announced back in June of 2012, only the
Belgian winner claimed their share of the prize. The English winner was a no-show. They either
lost the ticket or completely forgot about it. On December 5th, the 180-day
waiting period officially came and went, and with it went the life-changing money for that winner.
Because it went unclaimed that half of the jackpot was diverted back to the National Lottery, except
it was for good causes. The funds don’t just go to different charities or back to education.
They also go to a wide range of community projects, such as funding for art museums, or
money to build sports stadiums. 6 - $77 Million
This unclaimed ticket holds the record in Georgia as the biggest unclaimed jackpot since 1993.
The reason the record isn’t older is because the lottery didn’t exist in Georgia before then!
The Georgia Lottery reported that the ticket was bought on June 29th,
2011. 180 days later, the person who had bought it didn’t show up to claim it. On December 28,
the time had officially run out for the potential of a new multi-millionaire in Georgia!
So what happened with the unclaimed jackpot? The $77 million was distributed across the
different states that participated in the Powerball jackpot, with 42 states in total.
The amount each state got back was dependent on the number of ticket sales in that state.
For Georgia specifically, the portion of the unclaimed prize goes back to fund
more prizes and special promotions. 5 - $51.7 Million
The US Powerball has been running since 1992. From its inception through 2002 every single win
had always been claimed. But that changed just a year later.
The powerball jackpot in September 2002 stood at $103 million dollars. For this jackpot,
there were two winners. That brought the amount for each winner to roughly $51.7million dollars.
One of the winning tickets was bought in Pennsylvania while the other in Indiana, near
the Indianapolis airport. But only the winner from Pennsylvania claimed his share of the jackpot.
Did the Indiana winner lose their ticket? Did they forget to claim their millions? Or did they just
decide that having $50 million wasn’t worth it? We’ll never know the answers to these questions.
But what we do know is that the unclaimed prize money was shared among participating states
after the rightful owner failed to turn up within the set 180 days.
And this is after the lottery officials did all they could to encourage the winner to come out.
This included running commercials and organizing events at the store that sold the ticket. But it
ended up being all for nothing! 4 - $68 Million
Someone bought a ticket back on Christmas Eve of 2002. That ticket turned out to be worth
a whopping $68 million dollar winner. Unfortunately for that ticket holder,
they never got to touch any of that money. But, unlike a lot of unclaimed tickets,
in December 2003, a year after the ticket was bought, someone tried to say
they’re still the rightful winner! Dr Fritzner Bechette from Brooklyn actually sued the New York
Lottery. He claimed he knew where the winning ticket was all along! He claimed that he quote
“lost the ticket in a non-retrievable situation”. Interestingly though, he sued for 5 million
dollars less for $63 million dollars as the prize amount instead of the full amount for $68
million. That raised eyebrows to lottery officials about the authenticity of his claim. Of course,
eventually New York court ruled against Bechette. But not everyone lost out. The newsstand that sold
the winning ticket got $10,000 bucks anyways for selling a winning ticket.
3 - $63 Million This unclaimed prize set a
new record in California’s history, breaking the previous $28 and a half million dollar
record that had been running since September 2003. The winning ticket was sold on August 8th, 2015.
When February rolled around the next year, no one had come forward to claim the cash.
However, it didn’t matter for the store owner who sold the winning ticket, though.
They pocketed a cool $315,000 thousand dollars for selling a huge winner anyways. The winner,
on the other hand, would have received a lump sum of close to $40 million before taxes.
But there’s a twist to the story. Just as the window to claim the prize had closed,
Brandy Milliner filed a lawsuit claiming to be the winning ticket holder. According to
Milliner, he maintains he tried to claim the prize, but California Lottery officials
rejected the ticket, saying it was damaged. According to the California lottery commission,
Milliner’s ticket was too damaged to be reconstructed. That meant it couldn’t
be proven as the winning ticket. Then there was another bigger problem. Brady didn’t purchase his
ticket at the 7-Eleven store that sold the winning ticket. AND, he bought the ticket on July 10th,
almost a month before the winning ticket was sold! 2 - €11 Million
This unclaimed prize isn’t the biggest unclaimed ticket, but the story behind it is still quite
unique when compared to other unclaimed tickets. For example, the lucky holder of this ticket
was supposed to get the entire 11 million euros. No taxes, or any other deductions!
Lottery officials also looked for the rightful winner for quite some time.
Instead of the usual 180 days common with most unclaimed lottery tickets,
this German Lottery allowed an entire three and a half years for the winner to come forward.
In January 2021, the search was officially called off. It’s the biggest
unclaimed winning ticket ever in Germany. The roughly $13.8 million dollar jackpot in
2021 dollars on the other hand, was returned to the prize pool for the next lucky person.
The ticket was purchased at a store, rather than online or by a registered subscriber.
This means that the gambling association had no way to contact the winner. A physical ticket
with the drawn numbers would have been required to claim the winnings in person.
It’s not clear exactly when the winning ticket was purchased either, but
lottery officials narrowed it down to between March 29th and
April 1st in 2017. The store where the ticket was purchased wasn’t
also known. But it was narrowed to somewhere in the city of Reutlingen in southern Germany!
1 - $731.1 Million This is THE biggest
unclaimed jackpot by far. Someone won a whopping $731.1 million dollar Powerball jackpot! That
amount is so far the sixth-largest lottery in history! The winning ticket was sold on January
20th of 2021, in Allegany County, Maryland. While the winner hasn’t picked up their
stash yet. However, there’s still plenty of time left for the winner to show up. Also,
this isn’t unusual either. Big lottery winners often take their time to figure out their best
steps moving forward before they claim the ticket. However, even if no one has come forward yet,
the store that sold the ticket is still eligible for a nice $100,000 dollar check.
No one has come forward as of the date of release of this video. And they still have time to pick
whether they want the lump sum or annuity when they do come forward. For the lump sum,
the prize will come down to slightly over $540 million dollars before taxes.
The lucky winner is able to stay anonymous if they choose to. That’s because Maryland
is one of the states that allows anonymity. Will this prize become the biggest jackpot to ever go
unclaimed? We don’t think so. Here’s what’s next!