Holmes' Money

[SoDesuKa]

Am I wrong that James Holmes is a 24-year old student? Since grad students are notoriously poor, where'd he get the money to purchase all that weaponry? One report said he'd returned to San Diego and found only part time work in a McDonald's. Holmes also had a late-model car and didn't have a job.

How'd he support himself? Did he buy an arsenal with student loans?

[rfranklin]

1. A Visa card would have financed the attack...

I doubt that he was worried about paying the interest charges.

[maryellen99]

2. I read yesterday that his parents were paying for his education nt

[Honeycombe8]

3. He'd recently dropped out of grad school, I read. He completed undergraduate. nt

[geckosfeet]

4. Must have charged it with no intention of paying it back. Or he was financed.

The .223 rounds are about $.42 each in bulk, depending on brand etc.. The .40 is $.38 a round in bulk.

He had about $2000 worth of firearms, magazines etc. Not sure of the cost of the tactical armor, gas masks, gas cannisters etc. but he probably spent around $5k just for what he brought to the theater. Who knows what he had in his apartment. Apparently the authorities have still not entered it because of the booby traps.

Kind of begs the question, how does one afford all this stuff? At $10 an hour, in six months you gross $9.6k. Maybe you net $7500. Then you have expenses etc.

He must have charged everything with no intention of paying it back, or, he had a source of income other than his minimum wage job.

[hfojvt]

7. when I started graduate school in 1988, I had about $4,000 in savings

after two years of graduate school, making $5900 the first year and $6100 the second year and then a year of working as a part-time associate instructor for $8,400 a year, I had about $12,000 saved up.

Kinda hard to max out a credit card, Most of them start with a $1,000 limit unless you have had them for a fairly long time. When I was in graduate school though, I also had no credit card. Not sure when I re-applied for my Phillips 66 gas card. Probably not until 1996 when I got a car again.

The OP asks a very good question though.

[SoDesuKa]

9. Frugality

Your frugality is amazing. $5900 + 6100 + 8400 = $20,400, of which you saved $12,000, an astonishing 60 percent!

[hfojvt]

10. actually I only saved $8,000

I started with $4,000. There was also probably $800 - $1,000 I made in interest, which I no longer have exact figures for. Back then you could get 5-6% for a CD. I remember I loaned about $3,000 to my sister at 8% interest (which saved her over 4% on the car loan she had at 12.5%). Couldn't do that with today's interest rates. $9,500 at 5% interest is $475 a year. For that last year, I remember I was paying a whole $160 a month to rent a room, utilities included, and the year before that was paying about the same as I split costs with a roommate. The graduate school job also paid no FICA taxes, so that saved about $450 in taxes each year.

Looking back, I think it is sorta amazing that I saved ANYTHING on $5,900 a year. But that is the equivalent of $11,444 today, so it is not that little. My roommate, who was from India, called me "the man who lives on air".

However, many other graduate students had sources of funds - in the form of college loans.

Just to say, it is possible that he had 1. previous savings or 2. current savings, or 3. student loan and credit card debt that gave him the needed funds.

It still deserves to be investigated.

[Blecht]

5. This is America

It isn't a question of being able to afford something; the question is: "Can I get approved?"

A credit card that hasn't been maxed out is all anybody needs to finance a killing spree. I'm really surprised this doesn't happen more often.

[flamingdem]

6. Did he really work at McDonalds - gak the red hair is kind of like

Ronald McDonald. Maybe that made him snap.

[cali]

8. I may be wrong, but I think his parents helped him financially