New Hampshire is edging closer to legal betting after law passed in July that will allow up to five online/mobile options as well as ten physical locations.
New Hampshire Taking it to A Vote
The law that made sports betting legal in New Hampshire passed back in July. Now it’s up to the individual municipalities to put it up to a vote to see where the actual locations will be. The law will permit five mobile/online platforms and ten physical locations.
As only the second state in New England to legalize sports betting, New Hampshire is looking to take advantage of the situation before their wealthy neighbors Massachusetts get on board. If NH can hurry up and get their act together, there is a ton of out of state money to be made.
New Hampshire Looking to Attract Out of State Money
The biggest city in New Hampshire is Manchester. It also just so happens to be an hour away from Boston. As long as Massachusetts is not in the legal sports gambling business, New Hampshire stands to make huge profits. Delaware was able to take advantage of a similar situation with their close proximity to Pennsylvania. That situation has since changed now that Pennsylvania has legalized both only and in person betting. In fact, the situation has almost flipped with Delaware now behind due to their lack of mobile options.
New Hampshire won’t have that problem because they have already been approved for both. With that in mind, they’ve seen first hand that having the law passed is only the first step. It could be a long time before Massachusetts gets on board. That means that New Hampshire needs to take advantage now.
The Border Towns Will Have the Advantage
Due to the fact that Boston and other big cities in Mass. Are so close, the border towns in New Hampshire are already in the business of trying to attract their out of state neighbors. The deep pockets found in Mass. have always been welcomed in New Hampshire. The prospect of legalized gambling would take that to a whole other level.
Just locally, Boston is the most successful sports city in America over the last two decades. There is no shortage of action in the New England area. Rhode Island is the other state in New England but they are more difficult to get to as compared to New Hampshire’s more central location in the region.
Hoping to Start in Early 2020
While law makers won’t be concerned with the sports calendar, New Hampshire residents in favor of sports gambling in their community will hope they can get started by early 2020. That will be in time for the NCAA tournament and the NBA playoffs. The Super Bowl isn’t until early February so there would be an outside chance for that as well. Something that could be a local event given that the Patriots seem to always be there.
One look at the handle from states that have been taking sports wagers shows you that the football season shows more than double the profits for the rest of the calendar year.
