So I found this old thread from about a year ago on the BofA secured card that i found rather interesting. Several posters indicated they took the 99/500 BofA counter offer, DESPITE the fact that they ALREADY had 10k+ credit limits with other banks!
Can somebody shed some light on this reasoning?? Why is getting in with BofA that important??
I'm not judging at all, I seek enlightenment! I was also offered the BofA 99/500 offer...
I'm contemplating...
Here's the link to the original, locked post:
Pretty certain that was a one off.
The 99/500 card was something of a unicorn back in the day for people that were on the cusp of BOFA approvals... BOFA was one of the earliest to "recover" a more friendly lending profile than Amex/Chase after the mortgage crisis at least from an anecdotal reports perspective.
The biggest common thread here was "I applied for BOFA unsecured and they offered me this 99/500 card, what should I do?" and the overwhelming response was "take it."
Wasn't much beyond that, partially secured card with a rewards package (at the time they were close to the only one with a real rewards package on a secured card) and it was a pretty good every day card for those of us who were building back from credit ugliness, and the 3-2-1 card UW at a lower FICO than the BCE did at that point, and Sallie wasn't a thing yet, and other than the low credit limit for a $99 deposit you card a card that was identical to the unsecured, and it would graduate... so if you got the product you wanted and you already took the hit, why not accept it? Makes virtually no rational sense to decline.
@Revelate wrote:Pretty certain that was a one off.
The 99/500 card was something of a unicorn back in the day for people that were on the cusp of BOFA approvals... BOFA was one of the earliest to "recover" a more friendly lending profile than Amex/Chase after the mortgage crisis at least from an anecdotal reports perspective.
The biggest common thread here was "I applied for BOFA unsecured and they offered me this 99/500 card, what should I do?" and the overwhelming response was "take it."
Wasn't much beyond that, partially secured card with a rewards package (at the time they were close to the only one with a real rewards package on a secured card) and it was a pretty good every day card for those of us who were building back from credit ugliness, and the 3-2-1 card UW at a lower FICO than the BCE did at that point, and Sallie wasn't a thing yet, and other than the low credit limit for a $99 deposit you card a card that was identical to the unsecured, and it would graduate... so if you got the product you wanted and you already took the hit, why not accept it? Makes virtually no rational sense to decline.
I completely understand the post mortgage meltdown recovery period and BofA dangling a golden carrot for folks in recovery mode. Your absolutely correct in that it makes no rational sense to decline the BofA offer, especially after already sustaining the damage of a hard pull.
In this case, the people accepting the offer already have an established progressively seasoned, rebuilt profile. Some of the replies are from folks well ingrained in the 700's+ Fico score range. At least two or three of them had established credit accounts in the 10k+ range.
That thread that I linked was started, AND completed just last year. That's 2016. Well past the mortgage/housing debacle of ten years past.
So with this in mind, WHY would a seasoned rebuilder with an established credit profile be so inclined to accept a semi secured BofA card?
I can't imagine the same profile considering a Discover secured, or, to a greater extent, a Cap1 secured.
I truly am intrigued as to the rationale of this BofA offering and subsequent acceptance of the offer from well seasoned rebuilders.
@grillandwinemaster wrote:
@Revelate wrote:Pretty certain that was a one off.
The 99/500 card was something of a unicorn back in the day for people that were on the cusp of BOFA approvals... BOFA was one of the earliest to "recover" a more friendly lending profile than Amex/Chase after the mortgage crisis at least from an anecdotal reports perspective.
The biggest common thread here was "I applied for BOFA unsecured and they offered me this 99/500 card, what should I do?" and the overwhelming response was "take it."
Wasn't much beyond that, partially secured card with a rewards package (at the time they were close to the only one with a real rewards package on a secured card) and it was a pretty good every day card for those of us who were building back from credit ugliness, and the 3-2-1 card UW at a lower FICO than the BCE did at that point, and Sallie wasn't a thing yet, and other than the low credit limit for a $99 deposit you card a card that was identical to the unsecured, and it would graduate... so if you got the product you wanted and you already took the hit, why not accept it? Makes virtually no rational sense to decline.
I completely understand the post mortgage meltdown recovery period and BofA dangling a golden carrot for folks in recovery mode. Your absolutely correct in that it makes no rational sense to decline the BofA offer, especially after already sustaining the damage of a hard pull.
In this case, the people accepting the offer already have an established progressively seasoned, rebuilt profile. Some of the replies are from folks well ingrained in the 700's+ Fico score range. At least two or three of them had established credit accounts in the 10k+ range.
That thread that I linked was started, AND completed just last year. That's 2016. Well past the mortgage/housing debacle of ten years past.
So with this in mind, WHY would a seasoned rebuilder with an established credit profile be so inclined to accept a semi secured BofA card?
I can't imagine the same profile considering a Discover secured, or, to a greater extent, a Cap1 secured.
I truly am intrigued as to the rationale of this BofA offering and subsequent acceptance of the offer from week seasoned rebuilders.
I was just offering the historical context of the card, but really this isn't all that strange of an occurence here.
Why does someone need a metal card? (far more cashiers seem to think my CSR is sexy as compared to the general population regarding me in my recent Tinder experiment run back here in LA since returning... just sayin!).
Why does someone need 250K+ in unsecured credit limits?
Why does someone need 25+ credit cards?
There's no real explanation for all of human behavior even simply looking at the little slice of the pie chart on this forum; just because it doesn't make sense to you or me, and presumably we each think ourselves rational humans, doesn't mean it doesn't make sense to someone else. 
The BofA secured is different from most other secured cards in a number of ways. First, it unsecures at around 5-12 months pretty reliably. Looking back several years, most scured cards did not unsecure, though it is more common today. Second, the BofA secured card offered fairly competitive rewards (for the time). Finally, the BofA secured card did not carry a stignma once it unsecured. With many other secured cards, they either stayed secured forever or if they did unsecure, they were still stuck with low limits and no rewards. There are many stories of the BofA secured card eventually becoming a Travel/Cash Rewards or a BBR or something and ended up with big limits.
So, if you've already taken the hit, might as well get the card that can pretty reliably unsecure in less than a year and wind up as very useful with a nice limit.
@happypill wrote:The BofA secured is different from most other secured cards in a number of ways. First, it unsecures at around 5-12 months pretty reliably. Looking back several years, most scured cards did not unsecure, though it is more common today. Second, the BofA secured card offered fairly competitive rewards (for the time). Finally, the BofA secured card did not carry a stignma once it unsecured. With many other secured cards, they either stayed secured forever or if they did unsecure, they were still stuck with low limits and no rewards. There are many stories of the BofA secured card eventually becoming a Travel/Cash Rewards or a BBR or something and ended up with big limits.
So, if you've already taken the hit, might as well get the card that can pretty reliably unsecure in less than a year and wind up as very useful with a nice limit.
So here we have concrete features and benefits unique to the BofA secured card. The ability of this card to unsecure and grow to a decent limit, 5k+ would, in my opinion incentivize a moderately successful rebuilder to accept this card. The ability to earn cash back travel rewards while it's in secured status would also incentivize someone to accept the card.
Thanks Happypill for your thoughts.
@newhis wrote:Why? I think several people are afraid to 'waste' a HP. For me this is the main reason someone with a few unsecured cards will apply for BofA and take the 99/500 card.
If they don't fall in the 'waste' category, then they think that in less than a year, with good use, they will have a regular BofA card anyway and most of the time, if you use the card, they will CLI to 5K, 10K and more without issues.
Another great thing about the BofA secured card, is that if you are new to the credit game and have extra money, you can get the secured card as first card, put 5K on it and in less than a year have other cards with high limits.
Hey Newhis,
I'm starting to get a clearer, brighter picture. I suppose it comes down to good marketing on the part of B of A. Since a HP has already been administered, and regular, unsecured card has been instantly declined, a counteroffer has been made. This alone is pure marketing genious on the part of BofA. The difference in accepting a secured card would be that. The counteroffer.
Thanks Newhis!
In reality, $99 DOES NOT secure $500. Just the same as $1,000 would not secure $5,000. Or would $5,000 secure $50,000? The math is the same. In retrospect, I think BofA has done an excellent job marketing this card. I theorize that people receiving this counteroffer, would have been algorithmically approved internally by Bank of America for a $500 starting limit. So why not "hold' $99 for ransom for 6-12 months? This is genius on the part of Bank of America.
I'm still not knocking the card, I'm simply enjoying being enlightened by the market positioning of this strange little card. :-)