A woman has managed to find her missing lottery ticket in the nick of time to claim the whopping USD-half-million jackpot.

Ana Maya, 32, from the city of Graham in the US state of North Carolina, lost her winning lottery ticket five months ago during a house move and was running out of time to claim the whopping USD-532,234 prize.

Thankfully, she found the ticket in an old school notebook and was able to claim the Cash 5 jackpot before it expired.

North Carolina Education Lottery (NCEL) said in a statement on 17th February: “Maya, a 32-year-old customer service worker, bought her lucky Quick Pick ticket for the Sep. 6 Cash 5 drawing. Winners have 180 days to claim their prize before it expires.

“Maya said she was in the process of moving to a new house when she won, so she packed the winning ticket in one of her moving boxes. When she started unpacking, the half-million dollar ticket was missing.”

Maya said: “These last couple of months have been very stressful trying to find it… I totally forgot where I put it!”

Maya found the life-changing ticket on 15th February, with the expiration date of 6th March looming.

The lottery company said: “She finally found the ticket on Tuesday in one of her old notebooks from high school. She said she must have put it in there for safekeeping.”

Maya said: “I was very, very relieved when I finally found it… That was the last place I would have looked.”

NCEL stated: “Maya purchased the lucky ticket from Huff’s Interstate on Maple Avenue in Burlington. She claimed her prize Wednesday at lottery headquarters in Raleigh and took home $346,005.

“She said she wants to set some money aside for her two small children, pay some bills, invest some, and take a nice vacation.”