NC woman played the same numbers on a $1 lottery ticket for years. It finally paid off.
A woman who played the same lottery numbers on a $1 ticket over and over for years landed a jackpot with them, North Carolina lottery officials said Thursday.
“I’m still in shock,” Christene Costello said when she claimed her Cash 5 prize at lottery headquarters in Raleigh on Tuesday, according to a North Carolina Education Lottery news release. “I’m still trying to feel like it’s real.”
The Charlotte woman won the $129,926 jackpot with numbers she played for six years.
She beat odds of 1 in 962,598, according to the lottery.
Costello bought her ticket for the June 21 drawing through the lottery app.
She was sipping coffee the next morning when she found an email on her phone telling her she’d won.
“I thought it was a fake email,” Costello told lottery officials. “I really thought it was a scam. But then I verified it on the app.”
After taxes, Costello netted $91,923, officials said.
She plans to buy new kitchen cabinetry with part of her winnings.
“I had a flood in my house,” she said. “So, I was trying to figure out how I was going to afford to do the upper cabinets. This came at a good time.”
Costello also intends to buy a housewarming gift for her son, who recently bought a home.
“They’ve been struggling to figure out how to get a washer and dryer,” she said. “And I’m going to buy them one now. It all worked out.”
Carolina Cash 5 drawings are held nightly. Thursday’s jackpot is $175,000.
