Hi! I've previously posted for my friend but this time it's for me/my husband!
We are building my husbands credit up because we want to buy a house sometime in the next six months (preferable in July/August). We had our credit checked once by a lender to get pre-approved and we were a 639 and they require a 640 for the loan and a special downpayment/first homebuyer program. We've monitored our scores and it's come back up since then (after about a month it's now at around 650, paid the current CC down to 10%).
Our lender had suggested applying for a second CC for him since he only has one and only really only 2 years of credit history, saying it would boost our limit overall, it would be another account that's revolving and not installment, and it would be another positive mark if we kept it paid. We had been receiving Discover pre-approval things and went for it. He was denied. I suggested an Amazon card but he's worried another inquiry will drop us lower then the 640 again. He currently has 13 inquiries (according to transunion, a chunk of them were from 2 summers ago when he was thinking of going back to finish his degree and should be gone in July)
My questions are:
1. Should we take the advice and pursue a second CC?
2. Do the benefits of getting a second card (assuming we pay it ontime and keep the balance under 10%) outweigh the hit from another inquiry?
3. Does Amazon report to all three companies? How do I find this info out?
4. Should we just focus on paying our bills on time and keeping a low balance (ie under 10%)?
5. Generally how many points can an inquiry hit you for?
I was thinking the positives outweigh the negatives but I'd I'm not sure and I don't want something like another credit check keeping us from this program we want to get into, or delay our plans. Any help is appreciated
