California man was surviving on $200 a month. Then, he sold an old blanket for $1.5 million in 77 seconds

Cultural heritage is a valuable thing to hold on to, and sometimes, it can even turn life around in the most unexpected ways within a matter of minutes. Something similar happened to Loren Krytzer who was living on only $200 a month until a blanket changed his life. “Everybody loves a rags to riches story," he told CNBC Make It.

He knew that his life could change for the better when he found an old forgotten family heirloom, a Navajo blanket from the 1800s. At the time, Krytzer was living in a shack on the edge of California’s Liona Valley and had lost a leg after a near-fatal car accident. According to reports, he inherited the blanket when he went to his grandmother's house after her death, to collect the book that she had left for him. "Everything was already pillaged through by my sister and my mother," he said.

The last bag in that house had two blankets in it, which were passed down from his great-grandmother. One was a softer Hudson’s Bay blanket and the other was a Navajo blanket that his grandmother once laid out on the porch when her cat was having kittens. Krytzer, who grabbed the blanket, said, "I picked it up … put it in my closet and there it sat for seven years."

While Krytzer did thrive as a freelance carpenter, a car accident brought his career to an end back in 2007. After the crash, he spent months in the hospital dealing with nerve damage, and microfractures in his left foot led to an infection. "I kept trying to do the best I could, and finally it got so bad they said, ‘Now we have to cut your foot off," he told the publication.

"I mean, what do you do? I had kids to take care of, no money, you know? Nothing saved up or nothing like that," he said describing the situation. Finally, he started getting disability checks and eventually had just enough money to move into a shack in Leona Valley near Palmdale, California. He was barely getting through and surviving on ramen, while he drank vodka to ease the pain in his leg.

Then in 2011, he saw an episode of "Antiques Roadshow" in which an elderly Tucson, Arizona man was shocked to learn that his First Phase Navajo blanket was worth around $500,000. "I went and got the blanket and I’m sitting there holding it. … I’m lining up the lines on the TV with the blanket, seeing if they match," Krytzer said.  "This guy is on TV, the appraiser says $300,000 to $500,000," he recalled, before adding, "I’m thinking maybe this one is worth $5 to $10 grand."

He soon sent the blanket for testing and turned out that it was one of the finest and extremely rare blankets in the world belonging to a Navajo chief. The auction later took place in 2012, "I was thinking [I’d] fix up my car a little bit," Krytzer says. "I started praying, 'Please be enough to buy a house or something.'"

The auction lasted only 77 seconds and after a quick and fierce bidding war between a phone buyer and Don Ellis, the value of the blanket climbed up from $150,000 to $500,000 to $1 million before Ellis won with a final bid of $1.5 million.

Now, the man has a beautiful home, several cars, and a comfortable life. However, due to the high taxes in the state, he sold the house and chose to start a life in Idaho.