I am a newbie to posting but not a rookie to credit restoration. Twenty years ago I had a credit card in high school when everyone else was still learning. I had a $1500 cellphone when others were just starting to buy cordless phones at all. By age 20 I had about 20 credit cards averaging $2500 limits. And then my life came to a halt with personal and business debt skyrocketed.
I made a personal decision not to file for BK. And kept creditors away. I learned to deal with creditors and learned a number of "secrets" along the way.
In 2010 I restarted my credit life with PREMIER credit cards. Preapproved with $250 credit line and fees that ate up half the available credit line. That's not counting the annual fee which comes to $6.25 per month even on a $0 balance.
All these years I have learned to use debit cards responsibly and was one of the first people to sign up for the PayPal 1.5% cash rebate program in 2001. I never had a reason to seek credit accounts all these years and have learned to pay for everything in cash. The accasional inconveniences with car rentals and hotel bookings were offset by my PayPal debit mastercard + cashback.
Over the past year ( thanks to info on myfico ) I managed to kickstart my scores from 617 to today's 700+ scores. Granted it was not easy but nothing is impossible I have been told. 
Fast forward to this week I have made a consciouse decision to restart my credit ambition. I called Premier to remove the AF and they refused with my 3 year perfect payment history. So I said to myself it's time to retire PREMIER.
After reading every post on this board ( almost ) I want to thank everyone for teaching me new acronyms like BT ( balance transfer ).... BA ( balance allocation )....PC ( product change )...FR ( financial review )...... AA ( administrative action )...HP ( hard pull )...SP ( soft pull ).... INQ ( inquiries )....AAoA ( average age of account ) and yes.. GARDENING.
After perusing all the posts on this board it seems most reward programs are the same. If I were not interested in rebuilding and restrengthening my credit using a PayPal 1.5% cashback on all purchases would be superior to almost all rewards programs. No purchase category rotation..no expiration..no fear of paying the bill late.
So the goal for me is to find a rewards program that can beat Paypal while helping me to restrenghten my credit. I explored all the ways to buy money orders to pay bills at the least cost. Turns out Walmart and USPS are the two places that will allow people buy money orders with a debit card the cheapest. But it doesn't seem to be the most effective use of time wise to be going back and forth to buy money orders to pay bills for the sake of earning back 1%. The time spent could be used on something with greater ROI.
Having said that my credit scores now are as follows:
701 --- 709 --- 722
After researching the best rewards program I have narrowed down to AMEX ...BARCLAY with Barclay offering the following:
- 0% Introductory APR for 12 months on purchases and balance transfers
- 10,000 Bonus Points after spending $1,000 on qualifying transactions in the first 90 days of account opening - enough for up to $100 cash back
AMEX Blue Cash Premier offers 6% cashback on groceries and the AMEX GPR offering 25 000 points after $2K purchase in 90 days. Can't beat that.
After a month of calculated work two nights ago I said it was time to put all research to work. The reason I selected BARCLAY was because they only do HP with Transunion. Coincidentally I have ZERO inquiries with TU within 24 months. My greatest risk was with AMEX. AMEX typically do HPs on all 3 bureaus.
The goal is to get the 3 approved cards in one spree with the fewest HPs. We all know that too many recent IQs/too many HPs/too many new accounts are causes for rejection and also "cancelation" of new accounts. While it is possible to spree for more accounts in a short period of time it is my personal opinion after weeks of research that excessive INQs and new accounts can result in creditors cancellation of the opened accounts 60-120 days down the road. Thus. it's counter intuitive to attempt to open too many accounts.
I also believe it is better to restart with 1-2 decent credit limits ( $1000 ) than 4-5 ( $500 limit ) accounts. In 6 months time it would be easier and more advantageous to do CLI with 1-2 decent accounts than asking 4-5 creditors to increase to $1000 each.
After accounts are opened it is my belief that it will be easier to request CLI on 2 accounts from $1000 to $5000 limits than 4-5 accounts from $500. I had thought of asking a friend to add me as an authorized user to his credit accounts with 20 yr. history and $10K credit limit but I did not want to trigger any flag in the event of a manual review. It would not look right to see two credit accounts one with $600 CL and the other $10K. However I did consider doing it but it appears the only real value of being added as an authorized user is the increase of AAoA. My understanding is that an AU account payment history and credit line are not factored in terms of new account opening. Since I already have 7+ years of credit history I did not feel an AU was necessary for the few benefits it brings.
The result:
I applied for the Barclay's Mastercard and was approved for $1500. I called in to RECON and was denied because the only revolving tradeline I currently have is First Premier with $600 limit. I did not want to push it too far so accepted the reality..at least for now.
Almost simultaneously..I applied for the AMEX BCP and was approved instantly ( $3000 limit ). Immediately in pursuit of a SP I applied for the PGR card and was also approved ( no preset limit ).
There you have it friends.. 3 for 3 approved all within minutes of each other.
Strangely my EQ scores was not affected and no INQ shows up in my EQ report. I did not expect this to happen with AMEX since preliminary research shows they generally HP all three bureaus. I have not rechecked my scores/reports on TU but I suspect to see a Barclay HP there.
I suspect I only used up 1 inquiry/HP on TU to open 3 new accounts. Currently my EQ report shows no INQ for all 3 accounts. I will find out and update on EX soon.
Apparently the execution went well with the fewest HPs. The only thing stopping me is the fear of being flagged with too many recent accounts. I will wait 61 days to do the AMEX CLI and 6 months to request CLI with Barclay. At the 6 month mark I will be ready to do CLI spree for $10K cards...or new APPs for $5000 tradelines. The goal is to get a few high limit cards and not many small limit cards. In the end I believe having too many small limit cards will slow down the process of getting high limit accounts.
3 new accounts or 3 hard pull CLIs every six months appear to be the most effective way for high limit tradelines. Is there a better idea?
Welcome to the forum! Congrats on you new cards! You have a great plan thanks for sharing.
Discover IT $17k / US Bank Ace (VSig) $13.5K / US Bank Cash+ (VSig) $13.5k
Congrats!
Congrats!
Barclay told me the same thing...I wish I would have waited until I had a nice CL reporting before apping but too late 
Happy gardening!