To consolidate or not?

[Anonymous]

I have been working on credit repair and now have a few active tradelines.

Among other things, I have a Household Bank MasterCard with an $800 credit limit, and a Best Buy Rewards MasterCard with a $300 limit. The HSBC MC is my highest-limit card.

Once a year I have to make a tuition payment for slightly more than a thousand dollars. Several months later I get reimbursed by my employer for that amount. So it would be very convenient to have a card with a limit that would allow me to charge that amount. Convenient, but by no means essential.

So the question is, do I want to consolidate these two accounts and have one account with an $1100 limit?

The HSBC MC is not only my highest limit, it's my oldest open tradeline. It was opened in May 2002. It does have some dings, though, showing six late payments. The last and worst was 120 days in Dec. 2006. The Best Buy Rewards Card was just opened in April 2008.

Each card has a $59 annual fee. The Best Buy card has a lower interest rate and offers rewards.

So I'm really not sure if I want to consolidate or not, and if so, which card to keep. Any suggestions would be appreciated.

[Creditaddict]

if you can sounds like a good idea to get rid of the 2 annual fees.

Now that you have these 2 accounts, have you checked to see if you might be able to get something a little more prime with higher limit?

[Anonymous]

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@Creditaddict wrote:

Now that you have these 2 accounts, have you checked to see if you might be able to get something a little more prime with higher limit?

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That may be the best thing to do. I can't get a better card right now, but I should be able to get one very soon. I have a charged-off credit card and two utility collections all showing a balance on my reports right now, but all three have agreed to a PFD and I paid them this week. After they are gone, I should qualify for something a bit more prime.

[Red1Blue]

Combine the cards and get rid off AF on one of the cards.

[bamagirl1]

can you combine a hsbc mastercard and the best buy mastercard, since they are both hsbc backed or do they have to both be straight hsbc mastercard, etc to combine?

[Anonymous]

HSBC says I can combine them. They sent me a form to fill out and they want to know which account I want to retain and which account I want to close.

There seems to be a consensus that I should combine them and get rid of one annual fee. But the question is, which one?

[Red1Blue]

Keep the card that you had for longer time. I have combined two of my accounts into one. In my case both accounts opened at the same time so it did not matter to me.

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TeeVeeDude wrote:
HSBC says I can combine them. They sent me a form to fill out and they want to know which account I want to retain and which account I want to close.

There seems to be a consensus that I should combine them and get rid of one annual fee. But the question is, which one?

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