{"id":188011,"date":"2025-08-30T21:45:09","date_gmt":"2025-08-30T21:45:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/188011\/"},"modified":"2025-08-30T21:45:09","modified_gmt":"2025-08-30T21:45:09","slug":"powerball-fever-strikes-nyc-as-jackpot-soars-to-1b","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/188011\/","title":{"rendered":"Powerball fever strikes NYC as jackpot soars to $1B"},"content":{"rendered":"

New Yorkers are feverishly picking up Powerball tickets for their chance at becoming the next Richie Rich \u2013as the drawing soared to an estimated $1 billion<\/a> Saturday.<\/p>\n

A man in Astoria scooped up what he hopes is the lucky winning ticket for the massive prize, which would be the sixth largest jackpot<\/a> in the drawing\u2019s history<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cOf course I am [playing] \u2014 $3 and a dream,\u201d said the man, who gave his name as Mark and who was one of hundreds buying tickets Saturday.<\/p>\n

Matt from Astoria said he would buy a \u201cprivate island\u201d if he won the $1 billion lottery. Brigitte Stelzer<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t even need the full billion, just $100 million and I\u2019d be happy.\u201d<\/p>\n

When asked what he\u2019d do with the cash<\/a>, Mark revealed his dreams to \u201cbuy a boat, buy some people some houses, probably some charity.\u201d \u00a0<\/p>\n

The lucky winner would take home a lump sum of $453.1 million, before taxes, or the full $1 billion in annuity payments, which start at $4.5 million and increase by 5% each year to $18.7 million over the next three decades.<\/p>\n

At nearby bodega Smart Choice, owner Monte Ali sold 150 tickets within the first five hours of the shop opening. <\/p>\n

The drawing marks the sixth time the Powerball had ever reached $1 billion. James Keivom<\/p>\n

A dozen people lined up in just 10 minutes while The Post visited.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s much busier than usual for sure,\u201d Ali said between customers.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

\u201cEveryone who has come in today has bought one. I\u2019m basically making them, because they might as well, it\u2019s a billion dollars.\u201d<\/p>\n

The largest Powerball jackpot on record was $2.04 billion, won by Edwin Castro <\/a>in November 2022. <\/p>\n

Rosalba grabbed a ticket because of all the buzz. Brigitte Stelzer<\/p>\n

Rosalba from Astoria says she normally doesn\u2019t play Powerball because the odds are so low, but decided to play today because of all the buzz. Before getting a Powerball ticket, she played a few other games at Smart Choice.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cIf I win, I\u2019m going to enjoy myself and I\u2019m going to help people.\u201d<\/p>\n

Another customer said he hadn\u2019t considered what he would do if he won.<\/p>\n

\u201cProbably a private island. I mean it\u2019s a billion dollars right? Might as well,\u201d said Matt.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"New Yorkers are feverishly picking up Powerball tickets for their chance at becoming the next Richie Rich \u2013as…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":188012,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5122],"tags":[5229,6411,13107,5248,405,403,5226,5225,5228,5227,55355,67,586,132,5230,68,1154,2969],"class_list":{"0":"post-188011","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-new-york","8":"tag-america","9":"tag-lottery","10":"tag-mega-millions","11":"tag-metro","12":"tag-new-york","13":"tag-new-york-city","14":"tag-newyork","15":"tag-newyorkcity","16":"tag-ny","17":"tag-nyc","18":"tag-powerball","19":"tag-united-states","20":"tag-united-states-of-america","21":"tag-unitedstates","22":"tag-unitedstatesofamerica","23":"tag-us","24":"tag-us-news","25":"tag-usa"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115119910194253138","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/188011","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=188011"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/188011\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/188012"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=188011"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=188011"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=188011"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}