Featured Image Credit: John Moran Auctioneers
Ellie Kemp
Imagine sitting on $1.5 million for almost a decade and not even realising it...
This was the case for Loren Krytzer, whose life changed in 77 seconds after watching an episode of PBS' Antiques Roadshow.
The Californian native was scraping by on disability checks before making the shocking discovery.
Loren had been involved in a 2007 near-fatal car accident, resulting in his leg being amputated.
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He was down on his luck, renting out a friend's shack in Leona Valley with just $200 left to live on each month.
But he could never have predicted how his fate would change after simply watching TV one day.
Loren watched the PBS show in amazement when a man brought on a blanket that looked just like his own family heirloom.
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Antiques Roadshow experts told the man his 1800s Navajo blanket could be worth up to half a million dollars.
Loren's own blanket, passed down from his grandmother, had been sitting in the back of his closet for seven years.
"I never thought mine would be worth anything close to that," Loren told John Moran Auctioneers. "I thought it might be worth $10,000 or $15,000 or something."
But six months later, Loren's rare antique throw turned him into a millionaire.
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Initially, some auctioneers turned him away, but with the Antiques Roadshow episode fresh in his mind, Loren soldiered on.
He eventually attended an open appraisal day at John Moran Auctioneers, who identified the blanket as one of the rarest and finest of the Navajo chief’s.
Ahead of the auction, Loren was hoping to make enough to fix up his car and buy a house for him, his wife and three kids.
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Seventy seven seconds of bidding later, it was sold for $1.5m, smashing the previous world record of $522,500 for a similar blanket.
Loren used the money to sort his life out. He took his family on a Mexican vacation, bought a new car and not just one, but two houses - one worth $250,000. He invested the remainder in stocks and shares.
But gaining such a large sum of money isn't without its drawbacks. Loren lost his disability checks and a rather hefty tax bill came knocking - as did some distant relatives.
As reported by NY Post, Loren admitted: “I had people calling me and bugging me... People you haven’t seen in years - family members that don’t talk to you. You get some money, and they’re like, ‘Where’s mine?’”