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Howdy everybody,
So, with my awful credit, I now have eight credit cards, which should push me up to the next level of number of open accounts once they all report to the credit bureaus (per Credit Karma).
- On Tap CU Secured Visa: $1,000
- Skypass Secured Visa: $1,000 (still waiting to receive this card, US Bank has already debited my $1,000 deposit and says my account should be open my Friday)
- First Premier Bank: $700
- Discover It Secured: $600 (waiting for Discover to process my SSA-89 to validate my identity, should be completed soon as I did fax it to them quickly)
- Credit One Visa: $300
- First Access Visa: $300
- Capital One (Unsecured) Platinum Mastercard: $300
- Lane Bryant store card: $150 (so far, this card has not reported to the credit bureaus)
Also, three of these cards are particularly awful/predatory (namely, the First Premier Bank card, the Credit One Visa and the First Access Visa), so I'm looking at a good strategy to apply for better cards to replace these awful cards with. So, what do you think? I heard that NASA Federal Credit Union won't consider me for credit until two years after my discharge, US Bank and Amex won't consider me for unsecured credit until five years + 1 month after I filed my bankruptcy and I hear that I might have luck on a Chase reconsideration call once two or three years have elapsed since my bankruptcy with a strong payment history and a base of cards to work with.
So, what do you think my next step should be? CareCredit? After all, I do need financing for cosmetic surgery.
How old are these accounts? Have you opened them all since your discharge on 10/17? What's your utilization look like?
You have On Tap, Discover, Skypass, Capital One, and Layne Bryant (LB may not report until you make a purchase). That's five non-predatory cards right there. I think you need to stop getting cards (You've opened up 8 credit cards in three months...) and let what you have age until your AAoA is at least 6 months. Anything is possible, but its not likely you'll get "better" cards with such a recent BK dismissal combined with "credit seeking" behavior. After 8 months, Discover will *consider* graduating you to unsecured. Cap One may or may not ever increase your starting limit on that card, but with good payment behavior, you're likely to prequalify for another of their products with a much better credit limit.
Synchrony is all over the map regarding being BK friendly. You could apply and be given a $5,000 limit, or you could be denied. What is your timline on the cosmetic surgery? You just discharged a BK in October - You really shouldn't be planning to run up a significant debt right away! Besides the obvious financial risks to yourself, if a lender does a manual review of your report and they see that within 3 months of a BK discharge you already have a $10K credit card debt, it will waive red flags and ring warning bells pretty loudly.
I'm not planning to run up debt. In fact, all my accounts are paid in full and I'm saving money for cosmetic surgery, which I plan to have by October.
Then I apologize for jumping to the wrong conclusion! No insult intended.
I still say you have plenty of cards already and should let them age before you apply for more. That will actually put you in a better position to get "real" cards with "real" limits faster.
I could see how you could jump to that conclusion, given my credit seeking behaviour. However, my goal isn't to charge my surgery to any of these accounts. First of all, I have predatory cards that I only charge small things to (like maybe a cup of coffee) and I have automated payments through each of the issuers and the due dates marked in my calendar. If I need to make a big purchase, what I'd rather do is have the cash at the ready and use my Discover It and Skypass secured cards and pay for it with them and pay off the purchase amount immediately after making it.
Apart from that though, I use my three main accounts for paying bills (like electricity, Internet, bus pass, etc) and pay them off either in full or up to $20 before the statement date so my utilization is low. Then, I pay the rest off immediately after the statement is cut. ESPECIALLY with those predatory cards as the amount of interest charged on those is rapacious.
The goal is simple, to have a base of cards to show a responsible use and payment history with.
