Have you tried every tactic to remove the baddies? Goodwill letter, etc.?
I've been seeing Discover IT approvals with scores similar to that.. TU I'd worry about a little, though.
What if you waited until you hit those 700 goals? Any compelling reason not to? I just see a lot of people applying at the first sign of recovering scores, but why? "Get my foot in the door" is often a rationale, but I'm not sure I'd want my foot in the door at a poor interest rate. A good score, knowing you'll get whatever card you want, is so much more rewarding than just a decent card approval. Then again, another card might help you build a good FICO faster, I'm not sure. What about taking out a car loan? 
@Bman70 wrote:Have you tried every tactic to remove the baddies? Goodwill letter, etc.?
I've been seeing Discover IT approvals with scores similar to that.. TU I'd worry about a little, though.
What if you waited until you hit those 700 goals? Any compelling reason not to? I just see a lot of people applying at the first sign of recovering scores, but why? "Get my foot in the door" is often a rationale, but I'm not sure I'd want my foot in the door at a poor interest rate. A good score, knowing you'll get whatever card you want, is so much more rewarding than just a decent card approval. Then again, another card might help you build a good FICO faster, I'm not sure. What about taking out a car loan?
Kind of...I've tried GWs and PFDs but not to the fullest extent possible. You make a good point about waiting. Psychologically I think part of the reason is some people nearing the last stretch of the rebuilding process, like myself, want that feeling of approval and jump the gun. I'd say my rationale at this point is I have some mandatory expenses coming up in 30-60 days that I'd rather not tap into my savings for. Not sure about it improving the FICO, lots of opinions out there on that one. As for car loans I'm good at the moment...although a Duramax is tempting lol. I've got 2 paid off autos and 2 open autos. I appreciate you and everyone else who has offered advice on this topic! I've been looking for arguments from both sides the last couple of days to assist with the decision making process.
Glad you're looking for arguments from all sides, that's how to get a real brainstorm going. I totally understand wanting that approval feeling. I only bring up the interest rate thing to let others learn from my experience - sometimes the interest rate you get on approval will stay with you even after you get better scores. So apping for a Discover IT and getting 21+% APR, vs. waiting and getting 11%, could be significant. There's always the chance of recon, talking the right person into lowering the rate, but sometimes the easiest way is to wait. The nice thing about FICO is that you will get good scores, eventually, just by keeping out of trouble. So to me, "gardening" is exactly the same as having a nice card but not using it. Waiting for my FICO to grow so I can be approved for a 10k limit, is just the same as getting approved for a $2.5k limit then waiting for a CLI. Either way it's waiting.. and growing the score has the added benefit of better APR.
@Skye12329 wrote:
Discover, Chase, cap1 qs, would be a start for cash back. Im not sure how amex is with baddies, someone could chime in on that one.
Just a data point here. I recently was approved fom an Amex BCE with a 15k SL and a 18% apr with 6 baddies all from Jan-Feb 2012 and a EQ of 696...However I had two NFCU unsecured CC's with no baddies on them and 11k and 9k showing limits(9k went to 3k due to me reallocating CL from one to the other)...my util was 12% overall and I didn't believe the approval.
I don't know if baddies being all toghether mattered, showed as a rough patch that was fixed and all baddie accounts are still open except for paid VA collection.
06/26/2014 - Gardening until 7/1/15