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Review my Situation!

tag
09011323
Member

Review my Situation!

Alright!

So I've got a lot of accounts open right now and looking to streamline based on what you guys think is right.

 

FYI In college.  No loans or anything but water/electric bills just went into my name last month for our house and those are obviously being paid off just fine.

 

Checking:

BofA (In my college town this is the best of the Big Four available, currently primary checking, moving to Fidelity slowly but will keep for quick cash deposits which I can ACH off to Fidelity or pay off CCs)

Fidelity Cash Management: New fave; no fees whatsoever, ATM reimbursements same-day, very fast ACH, detailed, helpful website, my 401K and stock are here too

Ally: Opened when looking for a new account but never put anything in; thinking of closing off

Barclay's Savings: Same deal as Ally but I ended up never putting anything in

Navy Federal: Old checking account from when I was growing up; I kept nominal values in the checking and savings; my mom'll occasionally give me money and put it in here since her name's on it when I opened it at 16

 

Credit:

BofA Cash Rewards: 1/2/3% Cash back program's actually pretty alright, first CC issued back in October 2012, $800 CL (reeeeally low, I pay in full and used it for everything up until my Amex but I maxed it out once not realizing I was so close to the limit, that was embarassing but paid it off easily with a transfer from BofA checking)

American Express Gold: Just got this last week from a pre-approved offer in the mail and thought I'd go for it.

Have gotten numerous offers from CapOne, Citi Diamond, First Omaha Amex, etc

I'm PIF routinely and haven't had anything close to a late/not-in-full payment but the utilization on that Visa's got to be crazy high

Racked up some inquiries when I app'd for CSP, Freedom, Discover It before learning about credit here and before my BofA visa reported. Kicking myself now that I know better.

 

Goal Cards:

Chase Freedom, Chase Sapphire Preferred, Discover It (Maybe?), AmEx BCP (Maybe?),

 

So given this scenario, what would you close off? Add on? Wait and do nothing?

Message 1 of 8
7 REPLIES 7
navigatethis12
Valued Contributor

Re: Review my Situation!

I dont see a real reason to close any of the chequing accounts. Ally will close it by itself if you never funded it.

 

Bank of America raises limits pretty fast so you could try for an increase from them. There's nothing to be embarrassed about with going close to the limit; it just means you need a higher one. With less than six months of history you will not be able to be approved for much.

 

Chase usually likes at least one year of history before they will approve anything, but people have gotten in with less. If you shop anywhere that has its own credit card you could try for that.

 

The Citi Forward is for college students and give 5 points per dollar on restaurants, book stores, and some other stuff I don't remember. I wouldn't try for any other Citi card right now.

 

Capital One has nice cards for "Excellent Credit" but you would only qualify for the other cards and those are not so great. They are a good lender if you have good credit so you could still get a card with them and down the road change to a different one.

 

Have you calculated the annual fee into the rewards for the cards you want that have them? The American Express Blue Cash Everyday does not waive the first year and you have to spend quite a bit to make it worth it.

 

 

Message 2 of 8
john398
Senior Contributor

Re: Review my Situation!

Keep the Navy Federal account and when you start working they may give you a CL, Navy tends to be very libral with credit for thier members

Message 3 of 8
bs6054
Valued Contributor

Re: Review my Situation!


@09011323 wrote:

Alright!

So I've got a lot of accounts open right now and looking to streamline based on what you guys think is right.

 

FYI In college.  No loans or anything but water/electric bills just went into my name last month for our house and those are obviously being paid off just fine.

 

Checking:

BofA (In my college town this is the best of the Big Four available, currently primary checking, moving to Fidelity slowly but will keep for quick cash deposits which I can ACH off to Fidelity or pay off CCs)

Fidelity Cash Management: New fave; no fees whatsoever, ATM reimbursements same-day, very fast ACH, detailed, helpful website, my 401K and stock are here too

Ally: Opened when looking for a new account but never put anything in; thinking of closing off

Barclay's Savings: Same deal as Ally but I ended up never putting anything in



Off your main topic, but why not Ally/Barclays?   If I am reading it right, Fidelity Cash Management pays a really low 0.07% interest rate, compared to Ally's 0.40% (for lower balances) and Barclays 1% on savings.  Seems you need a LOT of same-day ATM reimbursements to make up for that, and a detailed helpful website wouldn't overcome those rate differences, no matter how detailed or helpful  (well, it it told you next week's lottery numbers, I guess so...)

Message 4 of 8
09011323
Member

Re: Review my Situation!

My only thing with Fidelity vs Ally/Barclays is the amounts I have just really aren't high enough to warrant the whole separate account; I feel like when I have a 'real' job when I graduate, that might be the time to go ahead and look at interest rates, but with the market keeping interest rates so low right now, I just really don't think it's enough to justify anything.  If there's something I'm missing let me know.

Other thing about Fidelity is I feel like they're so overlooked at how great they are.  Like every time I call in there's zero wait, the guy on the other end genuinely sounds like he cares and is very quick to help and I just feel like they've gone out of their way to make something that matches my personality.

Ideally, would love to have a Chase checking account but I'm in VA and Citi (which would have been my second choice) is in NOVA where my parents live and where I spend a good deal of time, but down in Harrisonburg the options are basically BofA, WF, BB&T and SunTrust and of those four I just feel like I see more BofA ATMs everywhere and the account I have has no min. balance or fees that I've come across.

Message 5 of 8
09011323
Member

Re: Review my Situation!

Oh! Suppose the other thing here is that although I am a college student taking 18 credits at JMU, I've also got a job at Starbucks that I've had for like five years.  Pay's laughable compared to what people in the real world make, but I feel like $11+/hr and 25+ hours/week during the school year and 40-50 outside school is more than enough when my parents are paying for everything anyway. =P

Probably why I was able to get the cards unsecured without a cosigner now that I think about it.

Message 6 of 8
bs6054
Valued Contributor

Re: Review my Situation!


@09011323 wrote:

My only thing with Fidelity vs Ally/Barclays is the amounts I have just really aren't high enough to warrant the whole separate account; I feel like when I have a 'real' job when I graduate, that might be the time to go ahead and look at interest rates, but with the market keeping interest rates so low right now, I just really don't think it's enough to justify anything.  If there's something I'm missing let me know.

Other thing about Fidelity is I feel like they're so overlooked at how great they are.  Like every time I call in there's zero wait, the guy on the other end genuinely sounds like he cares and is very quick to help and I just feel like they've gone out of their way to make something that matches my personality.

Ideally, would love to have a Chase checking account but I'm in VA and Citi (which would have been my second choice) is in NOVA where my parents live and where I spend a good deal of time, but down in Harrisonburg the options are basically BofA, WF, BB&T and SunTrust and of those four I just feel like I see more BofA ATMs everywhere and the account I have has no min. balance or fees that I've come across.


Yes, depends on your threshold.   If you have say $2000 in the account, with Fidelity you will get about $1.40 in interest over the year.  With ally, you get $8, with Barclays, $20.   Certainly not a huge amount but people get excited here about similar small savings on various credit cards.  Obviously as balances go up, the differences are greater.

 

Nothing wrong with Fidelity, but straight checking certainly isn't their area of expertise or concern, which is investments.

 

I use only internet accounts for checking, so all ATMs are free for use, so the brand doesn't matter.

 

But since you have a lot of accounts with Fidelity, I would add the Fidelity Amex to your card list, that is not AF, 2% everywhere, with the cashback going into your Fidelity account.

Message 7 of 8
09011323
Member

Re: Review my Situation!

Just out of curiosity, there's no way to get a Chase checking account from outside their network, right?

Message 8 of 8
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