Business owner closes shop for day after huge lottery win. ‘A real, real different day’

A business owner from Iowa picked an opportune time to win a huge lottery jackpot — just as he was planning to start a new business.

Alexander Perez, a 50-year-old owner of an auto repair shop in Storm Lake, has plans to close his business to start a venture in heating, ventilation and air conditioning.

His jackpot prize in the Iowa Lottery’s Extreme Green Progressive InstaPlay game will certainly help.

Perez said he purchased his ticket Monday, May 20, as he was out on a coffee run.

“I started drinking my coffee and I forgot about the ticket,” Perez told Iowa Lottery officials. “Like five minutes after, I started checking the ticket. And in the second row of the numbers, I saw three numbers and I was just comparing them to the winning numbers too many times. And I think I had like a panic attack or something. I couldn’t breathe very well. I just called my wife and she tried to calm me down for a few minutes.”

His reaction was justifiable — Perez had just won $295,300. It’s the top prize in the game that has seen the jackpot continue to grow for more than three months, lottery officials said.

He described the win as a “real dream come true,” but the distraction of becoming a lottery winner led to him closing up his shop for the day.

“I had to go home and start walking around on my property because that was a real, real different day in my life,” the winner said. “It was a completely different situation. I was looking around like I wasn’t sure.”

Perez claimed his winnings the next day — when his win finally began to sink in.

“This morning, I woke up and I saw the ticket two or three or four more times to be sure it was real, and to believe it,” he said.

Storm Lake is about a 150-mile drive northwest of Des Moines.

This story was originally published May 23, 2024 at 3:12 PM with the headline "Business owner closes shop for day after huge lottery win. ‘A real, real different day’."