Last year, Laura Hoyle and Kirk Stevens won the National Lottery’s Set for Life game, which means they will get £10,000 each month for the next 30 years.
Since winning the top prize in the National Lottery game, a Set for Life winning pair has found how much cheaper life is as a wealthy couple.
Laura Hoyle and Kirk Stevens have enough money to stock up on toilet paper and paste after winning £10,000 per month for the next 30 years.
The frugal pair have also paid for their phones in advance, cutting their monthly expenditures in half, and have given up takeaways and ready meals now that Laura has more time to make healthy meals since quitting her job.
Obtaining a mortgage has been tough for the aspiring landlords, with all but one bank rejecting their applications despite their substantial income.
Laura’s mental health has improved the most since she quit a job that had her crying every day when she got home.
Rather than working for someone else for 90 hours a week, the 40-year-old devotes her time to paranormal investigations full-time.
“We have actually got more stingy,” explained Laura.
“I haven’t gone for anything more upmarket since winning. For me, I look at something, and if it’s a thousand pounds I think’ no way, I’m not buying that’.
“Some people have always dreamt of having this kind of money and buying what they want. I look at something and think ‘that’s poor quality and not worth it.”
Kirk and Laura from Nottingham, who won the top prize by matching all five main numbers plus the Life Ball, spoke about how their lives have changed and how they plan to spend their money.
Shopping
When it comes to clothing shopping, Laura says the main difference now is that she will get a new outfit online instead of returning one that doesn’t fit – something she can do now that she is no longer in debt.
When it comes to labels, the Wolves native has remained loyal to Ted Baker.
What they consume is one significant shift. Laura now has plenty of time to cook healthy meals every day of the week since quitting her work.
“Before we were eating a lot of convenient stuff and takeaways, when I was working 14 hour days,” she said.
“Now I refuse to do that. We need to stay alive longer.”
Along with unhealthy eating, the couple’s mobile bill is another thing that has been cut down – from £40 each a month to £10 – as has the amount they spend on groceries.
“We’ve cut everything out. It’s weird,” Kirk said.
“We do tend to buy a lot of bulk. Why go to supermarket and get 16 loo rolls when you can go on Amazon and get 56 loo rolls for the same price.
“Same with deodorant. Shower gel, shampoo, toothpaste. That’s a lot of what we do now. The next door neighbour thought we were hoarding toilet roll during Covid.”
Laura and Kirk have discovered that life has become considerably more affordable now that they have a monthly guaranteed income.
“It’s kind of backwards, the more expendable cash you’ve got, the cheaper everything is,” Laura said.
“Like with our phones. We both have Samsungs and we paid outright, so it only costs £10 a month.”
Property
The couple is still living in the home they were in when they won the lottery, but they’ll be moving to a new home in Nottingham soon, swapping one bedroom for five so their Wolverhampton friends can visit.
“We need more room for all the bulk buying,” Kirk joked.
Laura, who is looking forward to splurging some cash when she decorates their new home, is adamant about her goal of becoming a landlord.
“Everything has been going into savings,” she said of their Set for Life winnings.
“The aim is to be landlords and to have a portfolio. When we won I said to Kirk ‘the next five years are not going to be plane sailing’. It’s about getting a portfolio together.”
One potential stumbling block is that mortgage lenders are wary of those who have made their money through gambling, as the lottery is officially classified, requiring them to demonstrate their worth by putting down a substantial deposit.
“I have only found a couple (of lenders) that will actually touch me, they will not mortgage a gambler,” Laura continued.
Splashing the cash
Since their victory, Laura and Kirk have been extraordinarily frugal in their spending.
Laura and her friend drank four bottles of prosecco together the night they got the happy news before watching the entire Divergent series to pass the time till dawn as her mind raced.
The most expensive buy was a Porsche Cayenne, which they’ve subsequently traded in for a Fiat Spyder for the summer.
They dine at the same Chinese and pizza places and saved over £500 by waiting until the Easter sales to buy two 85-inch TVs for their new house.
In the 14 months since their victory, no one has approached Laura or Kirk to ask for money. But that hasn’t prevented them from assisting their loved ones.
“We have helped people,” Laura said.
“We paid off car payments for family members and replaced TVs that had broken. (We helped) a friend that had a bit of trouble with her business. But no one has asked us for money.”
Kirk added: “We paid someone’s car tax. These little things can make people’s day if they aren’t expecting it.”
While Kirk resisted the urge to buy everyone a round in his local – partly because he dislikes the majority of them – he does love ordering additional drinks for buddies when they’re out.
Laura and Kirk discovered that, rather than the other way around, people wanted to buy them drinks in the months after their victory.
Work
“Every day she was coming home in tears, and then this wonderful thing happened. There was no thinking about it. It needed to happen.”
Laura now spends four days a week editing dozens of hours of footage she takes alongside Kirk during their paranormal adventures. She claims she liked her old coworkers but not her job.
Every weekend, the pair goes to a creepy locale, such as Nottingham’s National Justice Museum, and sets up six cameras in the hopes of catching a glimpse of something strange.
A scary creature followed Laura through the tunnels beneath Smethwick, and various shadow figures are among the highlights.
K & L Ghost Hunters is the name of the altered films that have been published to YouTube.
Laura describes herself as living the “dream” by working a job she enjoys on her own time and feeling lot more at ease in her life than she did previously.
Kirk has kept his manufacturing engineer employment while pursuing his master’s degree in advanced manufacturing systems.
“I’ve been training for nine years to get to the position,” he said.
“There was no chance I was quitting. If you’re doing something that you love, which I am, there’s no question.”
He wants to use his woodworking and electronics skills to create paranormal research goods in the future.
Because those payments will lose value over time, the couple is eager to create a property portfolio.
If the next 30 years follow the same path as the previous 30, that money will be worth roughly £5,000 when they make their final payment.
They’ve never spent more than £10,000 in a month, but they did lately enjoy spending £300 in one day.
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