SACRAMENTO – The California Lottery today announced that two more guaranteed $1 million Grand Prizes have been added for Saturday’s final Million Dollar Raffle drawing. That brings the total number of $1 million Grand Prizes to be awarded tomorrow night to nine! The clock is ticking Lottery players; don’t miss out on your chance to take advantage of the best odds of winning a million bucks ever offered in a game from the California Lottery!
Players have until 6:00 pm, Saturday, March 17, to purchase their Raffle tickets at any one of the over 19,000 Lottery retailers statewide. Raffle numbers are available for sale for $5 each. But don’t forget, buy four Raffle numbers and the Lottery will give you another one free! That’s five Raffle numbers for $20!
The Million Dollar Raffle offers players the best odds of winning $1 million ever offered by a California Lottery game. As of Friday, a minimum of nine $1 million Grand Prizes will be drawn on St Patrick’s Day, March 17. But, as Raffle sales grow, the number of $1 million prizes grows too. If all five million Raffle numbers are sold, ten $1 million Grand Prizes will be awarded.
Forty Raffle numbers worth $10,000 each have already been selected in the Million Dollar Raffle’s four preliminary draws. If you haven’t checked your Raffle numbers yet to see if you might have already won $10,000 in any one of the preliminary draws, visit: http://www.calottery.com/Games/Raffle. And don’t forget, even if you’ve already won, your Raffle numbers are still eligible for the Grand Prize drawing on March 17. All previously purchased Raffle numbers are eligible to win a $1 million Grand Prize.
The Million Dollar Raffle is played just like other “raffle” style games. There are a maximum of five million unique seven digit Raffle numbers available for sale at $5 per number. Numbers are sold in sequence and when all five million are gone, they’re gone. A minimum of five and a maximum of ten Grand Prizes of $1 million cash each will be drawn on St. Patrick’s Day. Currently, nine $1 million Grand Prizes are guaranteed for the drawing on Saturday, March 17. All prizes will be paid at cash value (no annuitized prizes) and must be claimed within 180 days of the draw. Odds of winning are better than 1 in 600,000. If all five million Raffle numbers are sold the odds of a winning a $1 million Grand Prize are 1 in 500,000.
Public education receives at least 34 cents of every dollar players spent on Lottery products. The California Lottery contributed $1.28 billion to education in 2005-06 out of sales of $3.58 billion, the sixth year in a row the Lottery has provided more than $1 billion in supplemental funding for education. Since its inception in 1985, the Lottery has contributed more than $18 billion to California schools.