To those thinking of applying for Discover It

[bs6054]

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@Rhaeny wrote:

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@kevinjjc wrote:

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@bs6054 wrote:

HiLine wrote

In terms of maintaining accounts, in general, it's never a good idea to close a card that doesn't carry an annual fee.

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Just wanted to comment on this as I think it is too strongly worded.    If you don't have balances on the cards you want to close, and have several other cards and  you have "enough" credit on your other cards, closing them is fine.  Closing doesn't impact AAoA for up to 10 years so it's just utilization to be concerned about.

There are several reasons why you might want to close an unused card.

1) The top one, already covered by HiLine is AF.  Obvious targets to close

2) Too much work to keep track.  Have to worry about fraud, getting lost/stolen, issuer adding annual fee etc

3) Issuer caps.   Want Card X from issuer, but that issuer has a limit (# of cards or CL) that you already meet, so you cannot get it.  Depending on the circumstances, you can sometimes PC or move CLs around without needing to close

4) Churning for rewards.  See Flyertalk.  For this group, once scores are high enough and account age is great, closing and old card and later applying for new (sometimes exactly the same one) cards doesn't significantly impact anything.

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Well put, bs6054. I'm glad you didn't just simply say "closing a credit card does not affect your AAofA".

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Well I should have clarified that the cards I was considering closing were a combination of (1) some extremely low limit cards that have not grown at all and (2) a bottom feeder sub-prime card.  My AAoA is not much of a concern because it is close to 7 years.  

The Avenue	$150
Catherines	$300
Creditone	$500
Victoria Secret	$750
Woman Within	$750
Genisys Visa (Elan)	$900
Walmart	$1,000
Discover	$1,000
Amazon Store	$1,200
Macy's	$1,300
JCP	$1,500
Barclays	$2,000
NFCU	$5,000
DCU	$7,500

The first 3 cards I was considering to close and they are 6 months old.  I can't get an increase to at all on these cards.  All of the rest were opened between Sept and Dec.  So when I looked at this on a piece of paper I couldn't believe that I had opened this many cards and was just concerned about AA.  Especially that Barclays card, however I didn't know about thier antics until I after the damage was done opening more accounts.  Most of these I PIF, however with Xmas I have increased my util to 14%.  I dunno, the CreditOne will definitely be closed when the year is up but that $150 and $300 limit cards just don't go with my current limits...LOL!

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You can certainly close the low limit cards without any damage if you can have a 0 balance on them.  Only question would be if they still have any value (presumably you opened them for a good reason!), if not, I would close.

[HiLine]

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@bs6054 wrote:

HiLine wrote

In terms of maintaining accounts, in general, it's never a good idea to close a card that doesn't carry an annual fee.

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Just wanted to comment on this as I think it is too strongly worded.    If you don't have balances on the cards you want to close, and have several other cards and  you have "enough" credit on your other cards, closing them is fine.  Closing doesn't impact AAoA for up to 10 years so it's just utilization to be concerned about.

There are several reasons why you might want to close an unused card.

1) The top one, already covered by HiLine is AF.  Obvious targets to close

2) Too much work to keep track.  Have to worry about fraud, getting lost/stolen, issuer adding annual fee etc

3) Issuer caps.   Want Card X from issuer, but that issuer has a limit (# of cards or CL) that you already meet, so you cannot get it.  Depending on the circumstances, you can sometimes PC or move CLs around without needing to close

4) Churning for rewards.  See Flyertalk.  For this group, once scores are high enough and account age is great, closing and old card and later applying for new (sometimes exactly the same one) cards doesn't significantly impact anything.

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I agree with your points. The reason I said it's generally not a good idea to close a card without a maintenance fee is because the cards that people feel tempted to close tend to be the oldest ones in the portfolio, which makes the benefits of keeping them tremendous in the long run. Sure, closed accounts still matter for AAoA purposes for 10 years, but if you need to break into the very high range for credit profile quality, you need a long history and probably an AAoA higher than 10 years.

[HiLine]

Bump

[TiggerDat]

Well I did apply for it, it didn't seem too bad.  It was not a good limit and I had to recon it.  They offered me an intro period of 6 months.  I think they are more Prime so at least this can explain the $1000 credit limit and the less than stellar terms.  At least I can PC it later!

[HiLine]

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@bernhardtra wrote:

Well I did apply for it, it didn't seem too bad.  It was not a good limit and I had to recon it.  They offered me an intro period of 6 months.  I think they are more Prime so at least this can explain the $1000 credit limit and the less than stellar terms.  At least I can PC it later!

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Welcome to the Discover family! You can easily switch to the It any time in the future!

[kclb]

i'm excited to try discover again...

can't wait to get my IT card. ha.

[HiLine]

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@kclb wrote:

i'm excited to try discover again...

can't wait to get my IT card. ha.

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Should've gone for the More.  But congrats and have fun with Discover!!! 

[KS13]

Link no longer working?

Directs me straight to Discover IT card page. 

Really wanted the $200 cash back :-(

[HiLine]

Looks like Discover has finally blocked access to the Card Builder ... Sorry ...

The best offer I can find for you right now is through my affiliate link which would give you $50 and me $50 after your first purchase.

https://www.discovercard.com/cardmembersvcs/acqs/app/getapp?sc=KBH2&iq_id=yraf_1028974953_em_15_1041...

Oh wait, I found a $75 Amazon gift card offer:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B007SP148M/ref=ccmp_swp_B007SP148M?pf_rd_m=ATVPDKIKX0DER&pf_rd_s=ri...

[KS13]

Okay so you can still apply over the phone for the Discover More card and ask for the $200 welcome bonus after spending $1500 in three months. Make sure to specifically ask for the More card with the welcome bonus. They'll have to look it up at first and then they'll find it. Did it for my Mother and myself.