While I see the benefit of waiting, certainly it depends on what the person is looking for. Personally, I don't need much of a limit to work with to make a card very usable.
I'm certainly someone that probably barely got approved for most of my cards. I certainly understand I'm at risk of not seeing meaningful CLI's over the next year or so because of that. But even with the tiny limits, I spend a ton of money on credit cards. I put basically every personal and business expense on credit cards (every place that will take them and not charge a prohibitive fee, at least). I can easily put $50,000 a year on cards with only one limiit above $1200. The low limits can be a little restrictive, but to do everything I'd want to do on a card, the increases I'd want aren't that much. A couple of cards with a $2000-3000 limits would more than cover me.
So the question comes down to this......is it worth forgoing 6-12 months of extra rewards gained in exchange for really high limits down the road? Maybe it is for some, but I'll be able to get about $1700 in cash rewards in 2017 with toy limits (and a half decent card SD'd). I'm not giving a good chunk of that back so that I'm in better shape for $30,000 limits in a couple of years.
If a company is going to blackball me from CLI's because I started low, that's fine. That's why I have a few different cards. If one doesn't want me using their card, there are others that do. Or not. I don't really care. The credit limit is only a purchase size maximum for me. I haven't written a lot of checks for more than $10,000 in my life
I sort of get the desire for high limits, but really, I just want to be able to maximize rewards. From personal experience, I know you can work the hell out of a few cards with $400-2500 limits.
Not trying to be argumentative. Just that for some, the risk of barely getting in and getting stuck at low limit is probably worth it.
