A 'mum-of-two living in one bedroom' has won a family home and a BMW after buying £2 tickets in a raffle.
The house, valued at £300,000, and car were raffled off by the Rowcroft family, who have spent years trying to start a new life in Brisbane.
Natalie Rowcroft, 33, a teaching assistant, and Bradley Rowcroft, 34, a joiner, have been a couple since they were just 14-years-old and have always wanted to live in Australia.
They finally decided to take the plunge in early 2020, only to be stopped in their tracks by the pandemic.
Struggling to sell their Salford five-bed, the pair feared their plans would never come off.
But then the couple, who have three sons aged - 14, 12 and seven - decided to do something different to make the move, starting a raffle to make their dream of moving to Australia come true.
Putting up tickets for £2 online, the family needed to sell 200,000 tickets to meet the value of the property in Hayfield Road, pay legal fees, and the fee to online competition host raffall.com.
They even threw in the keys to their BMW, as it would be too expensive to ship down under.
Now, after months of promoting the lottery for their home, the family have sold enough to announce a winner. She wishes to stay anonymous, but can be revealed as a mum-of-two who bought seven tickets to get out of the one bedroom her family was living in.
Natalie told the Manchester Evening News : "We did everything to get the word out. Some people bought two tickets, some bought 10, some spent more than £1,000 on tickets.
"It was so emotional when we announced the winner - I was crying, my husband was crying, my son was crying just because we've got to the end of this. The pure joy knowing we're getting our dream of moving to Australia.
"I'll never forget the day we announced the winner, my life changed and someone else's life changed instantly.
"The winners are just a local family from Salford picked completely randomly. The lady who won was absolutely over the moon. She couldn't speak when we told her and she's still in shock, she's got two children and they had been living in one bedroom in a rented house.
"She spent her last few pounds on tickets and said she hadn't even been following the results because she never thought she would win it.
"We hoped someone who really needed this would win it, I'm so happy it's gone to someone local in need. Her life will be changed for the better forever.
"We get our dream and we've given someone a life changing prize - it's a win win."
The family won an audience with videos posted on social media to drum up interest in the competition. Now packing their bags for the big move, they say they are taking their new fans with them.
"I've received messages from people who have followed our Facebook Lives and TikToks saying we're an inspirational family and we've kept them going during lockdown," Natalie said.
"People have absolutely loved Friday nights with the Rowcrofts! Now we've got 14,000 people following our journey because they want to see us get to Australia. We're definitely going to keep it up when we get there.
"This has been many years of planning and stress. Starting this raffle was massive pressure, if we didn't sell those tickets, we weren't going anywhere. Now it's all falling into place and our dreams are coming true - and someone else's have too.
"The Rowcrofts are moving down under!"
