Closing the OLDEST CC?!?

[Anonymous]

I have had a secured BoA CC for more than two years.  That was my first credit card and I have had to open a savings account to secure it (with a disgusting APY of 0.18% and an annual fee of $9, can you say B.S.). The CC itself has an annual fee of $29. Even with these rediculous conditions I'm thankful since I have a CS of 746 right now and ability to get the best CCs around.  So my question is, should i close my oldest account with $3,000 CL (which represents about 25.6% of my total CL), or should i contact Bank of America and get it unsecured with better conditions??!!?

Please give your opinion.

[haulingthescoreup]

My understanding is that the BofA secured card will convert ("graduate") to unsecured and keep the history. Does yours not do that?

[unknown_entity]

I'd keep it open and PIF if I used it.  The $29 is very nominal in the AF world.  A small price to pay for the history.  IMO.  You may want to call B of A and see if you can "graduate" the secured card to unsecured.   If you don't have any lates or baddies with that account, I'm sure they can do something along those lines.

[Anonymous]

Apparently it doesn't graduate automatically, so I'll call the bank and make them graduate it.  But my original question was (forgot to ask it), how long does a closed account stay on the CRs?

[KingAdrock]

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@Anonymous wrote:

Apparently it doesn't graduate automatically, so I'll call the bank and make them graduate it. But my original question was (forgot to ask it), how long does a closed account stay on the CRs?

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10 years.

[Anonymous]

Yeah but does it affect adversely your credit score in any way?

[unknown_entity]

You keep the history, but after 10 years it drops off your report.  When you close an account, the only thing that impacts your score initially, is the loss of utility as it no longer reports as available credit.

[Anonymous]

For the 10 year thing, this is 10 years from the date it was closed right?


So if I had a credit card for 5 years before closing it, it will be 15 years from the date I opened it before it ages off?

[unknown_entity]

Yeppers.

[jmbfl]

If you have a closed account with a balance the balance counts toward the util calculation but the reporting CL does not - is that correct?

How does a closed account effect the age calculation?