It’s almost that time of year again when tens of thousands of Calgarians will be lining up to see what the newest dream home on Stampede Park has to offer.

In just eight days on July 4, they’ll get to see the $1.38 million grand prize for the Rotary Home Lottery.

While the 2-storey, 4-bedroom, 3-bathroom home with amenities like in-bathroom saunas and off-suite balconies might be the initial draw, the real beneficiaries of the lottery are the many local Calgary charities that win big when locals vie for the grand prize.

“I believe that people, for the most part, don’t really understand where the money goes. This year my mission is to make sure that people do understand that the money goes to charities in and around Calgary and it makes a huge impact,” said Richard Agnew, Chair of the Stampede Lotteries Committee.

“Without the money that they get, received from their partners, they wouldn’t be able to operate. There are some pretty amazing charities out there doing incredible work.”

Through the Stampede Lotteries, and their partners the Rotary Club of Calgary at Stampede Park and the Kinsmen Club of Calgary, many other organizations have received, and will receive again this year tens to hundreds of thousands of dollars to directly support their operations.

Charities win big when Calgarians dream big

Among those charities are the Prostate Cancer Society, Autism and Asperger’s Society, The Legacy Place Society which supports first responders and veterans who are affected by PTSD and occupational stress, and the Ronald McDonald House to support sick children and their families with free housing and supports during their hospital stays.

John Shield, Chairman of the Rotary Club of Calgary at Stampede Park, said that “every nickel” raised by Rotary through the Dream Home Lottery goes directly into the community thanks to being completely volunteer-run and without any overhead.

This year, he said, the goal is to beat last year’s record-breaking lottery sales.

“We’re hoping that this year, based on attendance projections, we should have record sales again. The goal is a million—if you don’t have a goal, you can’t can’t hit it. The year before we were just under $700,000.”

Agnew said that it has been an emotional and awesome thing to see charities receive their funds raised through the lotteries.

“I get to go into the booths and I get to meet some of the charities that actually volunteer inside the booths. I get to hear their stories about how they are affected, and how there’s no way they’d be able to operate unless they had the money from Rotary or Kinsmen,” he said.

“It’s emotional. It’s truly emotional.”

His own family members, he said, have been beneficiaries of that gift given by the hope of Calgarians, via the funds raised through the lotteries for the Calgary Marching and Showband Association.

“I’ve been really fortunate that my two daughters who were in the Calgary Stampede Showband received some incredible life experiences. It’s important for me to make sure that I can give back to the Calgary Marching and Showband Association, and of course, our other two partners,” Agnew said.

This year’s dream home continues a 70-year legacy for the Stampede

Agnew said that a lottery for a dream home has long been part of the Stampede tradition, stretching back to the second half of the 20th century.

He said that committee members had recently visited what was then called the “giveaway home” from 1960.

“It wasn’t called Stampede Lotteries at that time, but that’s sort of when we started our partnership or that’s when the lottery started, and it’s been a great ride ever since then, up to today,” Agnew said.

According to Calgary Herald newspaper archives from 1960, the home visited by the Stampede committee was a $30,000, six-room bungalow, that during that 10-day had more than 22,000 people view it.

Tickets were sold for $1 each by Calgary’s Junior Chamber of Commerce.

Although today, ticket prices haven’t risen on a per-ticket basis much. The Stampede Lotteries range in package price from $75 for 50 tickets (25 each for the Rotary and Kinsmen prizes), to $250 for 500 tickets (250 each for Rotary and Kinsmen).

Compared to the very first home, ticketed off in 1959, this year’s Dream Home has a few more amenities.

Eschewing the pink kitchen enamel finish, mahogany brown walls, and electric shoe polishers and bottle warmers of the period, the latest Dream Home comes equipped with a luxury fireplace, dry sauna, rain shower, and a two-story vaulted living room with Juliet balcony.

The televisions are bigger too—with full-sized flat-screen TVs instead of the then state-of-the-art 21-inch sets.

“It’s a beautiful home, and it’s very comfortable for sure,” said Julie Punter, Show Home Interior Design Manager for Homes by AVI, the builder of this year’s Dream Home.

“This year we went with a natural luxury modern retreat.”

She said that the process to design and build the home is really a year-round project, with design work starting in November, and then homeowners taking possession in the following February after Stampede.

“It’s very exciting because every year is something so different. We try to make it different, more interesting, with different items in the house, and something that we haven’t done before. That always gets harder and harder, obviously,” Punter said.

After the Stampede, the home will be taken apart in several pieces and transported to the community of Rangeview.

According to the company, the Dream Home was built with two different floor systems for the top and bottom parts of the home, along with vertical separation points in the roof structure to allow it to be moved.

These will be taken apart, transported, and then refashioned together much more solidly than they are for the Stampede grounds. The siding and roofing will also be redone on the home before the winner takes possession.

Photos from the 2024 Stampede Lotteries Rotary Dream Home