I am in the process of rebuilding my credit after a bankruptcy. I currently have 4 revolving accounts, one which I don't use (david's bridal, but it has a 3.5k limit that nicely inflates my available credit so leaving it open), a Zales credit card with a 1k limit and a $69 balance, a Capital one card with a 1k limit and a $950 balance, and a Merrick bank double your line with an initial $600 limit that will double to $1200 if I make payments every month with a $460 balance, but a posting balance of $270. The capital one has a 9 month 0% apr and is near maxed out because I used it to pay medical bills, I am intending to float that debt while the 0% apr is in effect. the DYL card was recently used for black friday purchases. My original intention was to pay the "black friday shopping spree" balance on the DYL card off in two months, the payment is due Dec 20th, so the statement for it will cut around that time. I was planning on having the balance down to $200 when it cut. This card also has the highest apr of all cards, so I definitely don't want to carry a balance long.
I am more concerned about how this effects my credit than which card charges interest or anything else for that matter. Since August, my credit score has gone from 520 to 595. I get weekly updates on the credit score. Oddly enough, even with the capital one maxed the score has continued to climb, and even with the DYL posting at 50% of the credit limit my score jumped from 581 upon opening the card and showing the $600 CL to 595 just today.
I make slightly over min wage, so even though a balance of $400 seems easy for someone to just pay off in one go, it's not feasible for me. My monthly budget includes about $300 a month for paying down CC's. I am not sure if this week I should pay $100 on the capital one, or $50 on the DYL an $50 on the CO. I am intentionally paying the minimum payment on the zales card (which started with a $94 charge for jewelry repair) because I have absolutely no plans to buy jewelry anytime soon and I want it to keep reporting a balance. I am not sure which plan will affect my scores more positively, splitting payment efforts between the CO and DYL card so that I don't have one card reporting at 95% utilization or if I should just aggressively pay down the DYL card because of the interest. I would also like to ask CO for a credit limit increase but I am wasting my time doing that if the card is near maxed out.
Is it overall utilization or does having one card near max hurt my score? My overall utilization is only 22%.
