Just curious - Is the Heart Foundation lottery legit or a scam?
Have you personally or do you know of anyone that has won a prize from them?
Heart Foundation Lottery - Is It Legit?
Martz5 on 18/10/2023 - 15:09
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Thanks for clarifying.
I’m not too sure to be honest. Maybe just the fact the top prize is a new house every 1-2 months seems a bit much. I wouldn’t have thought they sold enough lottery tickets to cover all the prizes but i stand corrected.The foundation has these prizes donated by their major sponsors.
For example, the fully furnashed home is donated by Jennian homes so essentially all of the proceeds from the lottery ticket sales go to the charity rather than having to cover the cost of the prizes.
They give away a house every few months worth around 1m sometimes less and bring in about 14m a year in lottery income, so they could simply just pay for them based on that. Reality is the houses are ex Jennian homes show homes most of the time and so Jennian seem to donate them (or if not just give them away, sell them at a deep discount) and the furniture etc is already in them given they are showhomes and a lot of those are supplier donated so that gets thrown in anyway.
So it generates a lot of cash for them to do the work they do.
Heart foundation is a super legit organisation, while I dont know personally anyone who has won, I do have a house nearby a house that was won and someone definitely got it .
I have an autobuy setup for years because its a good cause and also your odds of winning albeit still very low (1 in 100k or something) are still a lot higher than powerball or lotto for example.
There are 250000 tickets available, so the worst odds are 1/250000 (assuming all tickets are purchased).
If you buy 1 ticket at $15 vs buying 21 lines ($14) for standard nz lotto, your odds of winning is 21/38,383,80=1/182780 vs 1/250000So would be better odds if there are less than 182780 tickets purchased.
Not sure which prize pool is bigger (standard lotto vs NZ heart foundation).
@Tinyking: You forget that in lotto you need to match numbers as well. By the looks of it here it's only the lucky draw. So the odd's are way better than lotto.
@ace310: @ace310 1 line of lotto odds is 1/3,838,380, which costs $0.70.
You have to spend at least $15 for 1 ticket for the heart foundation ticket, so if you spend $14 on lotto (to get 21 lines), your odds of winning 1 million vs a house valued at 1 million is better.
1/250000 vs 1/182780, a 36% better chance (assuming all 250000 tickets are purchased).
Unless I am missing something.@Tinyking: I haven't checked your maths, but in Lotto (at least) there is the chance that more than one ticket (line) will win the top prize, in which case (I believe) it is shared between the tickets.
If so, you'd need to account for that too?
@Alan6984: @Alan6984 That is a good point, no chance of sharing the prize via the Heart Foundation lottery.
I wonder what the average odds are you would be sharing the 1 million dollar prize pool, chances would be a lot higher when powerball has a large jackpot.I wonder what the average odds are you would be sharing the 1 million dollar prize pool, chances would be a lot higher when powerball has a large jackpot.
Well, if your maths above is correct (I am not saying it isn't!), then I would say that, given you have a winning ticket (line), then your chances of sharing it with another person might be:
N / 3,838,380
where N is the number of people with that line.
The value of N will vary significantly though. For example, I would guess that many people choose (1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8) or however many numbers you choose for the lottery, and their reasoning is likely something akin to, 'Nobody else will choose 1,2,3…' so I will!
Also, if you choose birthdays (again, l suspect many will), you will be more likely to share a prize, than if you have numbers of 32 and more (since they cannot be birthdays), but I'd avoid 40,39,38….
I'm not going to even attempt the maths though :-)
… in Lotto (at least) there is the chance that more than one ticket (line) will win the top prize, in which case (I believe) it is shared between the tickets… If so, you'd need to account for that too
Two people winning does not affect the odds of winning. Just the prize received.
Yes, but you should take it into account still, otherwise you're fooling yourself (to whatever degree).
@Tinyking: Not that its scientific - but I dont think they ever come close to selling out. That's evidenced by their financials where they say they make about 13m a year revenue out of it. At 15 bucks a ticket thats only 860k tickets a year and seem to do about 6-8 draws a year. So around 100k tickets per draw based on that.
Interesting conversation. Ill keep buying as its a good cause that I want to support - getting a free house or some other thing would also be good :)
@Meridian: @Meridian Didn't think to look at their annual review, shows that they did receive 13m revenue as you said in 2022. They had 6 draws that year. So each draw had roughly 146000 tickets sold. (13,375,000/15/6=145930)
Better odds for 2022, I wonder if 2023 if they are selling more tickets.
As @Alan6984 pointed out no chance of sharing the prize, which feels like a big factor.
I think the Heart Foundation is a great cause too, so worth buying, even without looking into the numbers.
@Tinyking: They are advertising the draws a ton this year on radio.
I agree about them being a great cause and the tiny chance to win is a big bonus, at the expense of not being able to claim 33% back because you are potentially getting something in return for the donation.
@Tinyking: I see it as a downside the prize sharing in lotto - whilst the odds remain the same to win - but the outcome of winning potentially a lot worse so its like a draw within a draw. Best case you get it all, worst you get a lot less. I believe the record week there were like 30+ winners of 1st division who all got like 30k
I would much rather enter a prize draw for $15 to win a 1.1m prize and I get it all.
Times are tough, if you have limited cash, I guess stuff like this is an easy thing to drop. Hence why they are advertising a lot more.
Im staying in thou, so this is good news for me :) less people.. better chance.
less people.. better chance.
Perhaps. It would depend on the terms of the draw, and whether there is a guaranteed winner (as in most raffles) or not (as in the lottery most weeks although there are sometimes guaranteed wins when the jackpot gets big enough).
I would guess the former, so you are likely correct, and it is a good point to factor in!
@Alan6984: Don't know what the technical terms are and if they could pull the draw or more likely extend the close date to get more entries. But it's never happened in the past.
It's only a scam in so much that its a lottery. Granted better odds than the national game, but still a long shot punt (other than the feel good factor of helping a charity)
The real scam was Bonus Bonds from a bank. Glad that's over haha.
It's been going for many years and yeah it's legit alright. A friend of a friend won a house.
A colleague of mine at an old job won a house. It’s totally legit, they ended up moving to the other end of the country to live in there.
There's also the Coastguard lottery - https://www.coastguard.nz/get-involved/coastguard-lottery/ and the suicide Reduction Trust has just launched Win a House - https://winahouse.co.nz/
Note, while they are charities, for tax purposes these are not classed as donations:
"For every donation you make to Coastguard, you are able to claim 33.33% back as a tax credit. As an example, if you make a donation of $50, IRD will give you back $16.67 at the end of the tax year. Please note that you cannot claim tax credits for memberships or lottery ticket purchases (but you can claim for donations you make at the same time as those purchases)."
What makes you think it is a scam?
They list the results online (https://www.heartfoundation.org.nz/get-involved/heart-founda…)
Plus they are registered charity (https://www.register.charities.govt.nz/Charity/CC23052) so their financial statements will be audited annually.