- Looking at Lee Ryan painting peoples' property for a living, it is difficult to imagine he was once a wealthy man worth KSh 1.1 billion
- The windfall came in 1995 when he won the National Lottery in 1995 and bought a mansion with a pool, superbikes, an aircraft, and several fancy cars
- Five years later, Lee was broke, homeless, and bitter, a development that made him say the lottery is cursed
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When Lee Ryan won a whopping £6.5million (KSh 1.1 billion) from the National Lottery in 1995, many concluded that poverty would never be his portion again, forever.
How wrong were they, because Lee was broke again within just five years, and just penniless but also homeless and living on the streets.
According to Wales Online, the family man splashed his windfall on a mansion with a pool, two Ducati superbikes, an aircraft, and several fancy cars.
Among the high-end vehicles that sat in his parking was a Bentley, a Ferrari, a Porsche and a BMW with number plates LEE 1, LEE 2, LEE 3 and LEE 4.
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Lottery is a curse, Lee
When he parted with his millions within such a short time, Lee was so heartbroken that he referred to the lottery as "a curse."
He indicated that having been there, he learned that people always think a win automatically means the end of their worries, but that is not true.
"This is just the beginning of your worries. You will see who is who in your life, even in your own family it becomes fractured. It’s all just an illusion really. All these possessions trap you," he added.
Lee has reason to make such claims as he was forced to hire an ex-SAS soldier to guard his family after getting wind of a plot to kidnap one of his children.
Spent 9 months in prison
Not long after winning, Lee found himself on the wrong side of the law and was sentenced to nine months behind bars for handling stolen cars.
That was not all, his marriage to Karen ended in 2003 and the couple sold their mansion, after which he got a new girlfriend named Jyldyz Djangaracheva.
They relocated to her home country, Kyrgyzstan, central Asia, where Lee also lost £2m (KSh 359 million) in failed investments.
He ventured into large scale fish farming but claims local mafia bosses stole his fish, followed by his second divorce and eventual collapse of his money empire.
Lee is now a decorator
He reiterated that it was a crazy experience to move from vast wealth to poverty, one he will never forget for the rest of his life.
After leading a lavish lifestyle and losing it all, the now 63-year-old helps out at a homeless shelter that once housed him by offering free decorating services.
The one-time billionaire still plays the lottery hoping to win again, but this time he has learned his lesson the hard way and vows to spend the cash helping the homeless, The Mirror reports.
“Apart from death, you can’t get much more rock bottom than being homeless, so I tested myself and it’s all good," he posits.
Money will never change Lee again
According to him, opening a hotel for the homeless would make him feel that he has done something worthwhile with money.
“I believe in the law of attraction, so I think I will win again, but it won’t mean any more to me than it did before. I know it sounds weird, but I don’t need anything,” he said.
Lee also revealed that the biggest past of his money was used to help people that he believe needed it the most at the time.
He says he used to slip envelopes of cash to homeless people, something that gave him the most pleasure from having money.
The one other thing he has promised himself is to keep the information to himself if luck smiles at him again.
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