SAN ANTONIO -- The first of many decisions the Powerball jackpot winner would have to make is whether or not to take their winnings in one lump sum called the "cash option," or the annuity payments which are split up over three decades.
Most people that KENS 5 spoke to said they would take the cash option, except for one guy.
"Probably split it up over the 30 years," Rudy Gomez said.
He bought four tickets tonight, and has a good reason to go with the annuity.
"It seems more smart and would help me manage my money," Gomez said.
If you go with the lump sum, you would end up with $930 million before taxes. With the annuity payments you would get the whole $1.5 billion before taxes, paid out yearly for 29 years. The first payment would be $22.5 million.
What do financial experts say you should do?
"It depends on how good you are with your money and how good of a saver you are, and how many interesting relatives you have that might come out of the wall, and the woodwork, to take the money from you," said Kim Ford of theKFORDgroup.
For those that said they'd take the cash option, which comes out to about $700 million after taxes, they all say they had good reason.
"I would pay all my friends, student loans off at school, all of our nursing students that paid," Felicia Randle said.
"I would use it to get out of debt," John Jones said.
"We would donate some of our money, to a couple churches and our family," another couple added.
But what if you are good at managing money? Could you actually make out better taking the lump sum?
"If you are a pretty savvy investor, it might make a lot of sense to go ahead and take the lump sum," Ford noted.
Regardless, Gomez says he just wouldn't trust himself and would split it up.
"Seems like it's the right thing to do. You would probably go spend it all on stupid stuff."
If you did decide to take the cash option, which works out close to that $700 million figure, you could give every resident of San Antonio $500.