Total amount of cards? Canceling my cards? And more?

[ashber]

I've looked somewhat, but I can't find the answer to my question. Maybe I am not wording it right. What is the best amount of credit cards/charge cards to have? Is it like 3-4? I know the average person has more, I think so anyways. In that mixture, how many of each (credit, charge). I was trying to tell my fiance, but I can't remember or seem to find the information. I have 12 at the moment, 9 with balances. I am paying my cards down, and then I wanted to cancel them. But I am not sure which ones to cancel and which to keep. The * are the ones with zero balances.

Best Buy $1500

Firestone $1400

Nordstroms $1000

GHCU Visa $950 

JCPenney $900

Sam's Club $900 

Macy's $800

Juniper $500

GHCU Visa $300

*Helzberg $302 (was $3250 but didn't use it and HSBC lowered it)

*Kay $1000

*Mattress Place $2550 (was bought out, but they said they would close it after year of inactivity, no longer able to charge)

Hmm.. I feel that I should keep the higher Visa, and then I am not sure which others. I was reading the postings and it looks like people have a hard time getting one or two of those cards? Within a couple days the Best Buy, Macys, and Visa $950 will be at zero balance. I am 22 years old so all of these cards have about the same age, Best Buy being the last card I got. Also, if anyone can answer this, I will be done with school in 2 1/2 years, and will be getting married in 3 years. What should I do to prepare myself for this? I am not worried about the wedding costs, but about buying a house a little bit after marriage. How can I raise my credit score within this time frame? It's around 600. No lates ever, 2 collections from 5 years ago. Just have a problem with keeping the balance down, I have a little bit of a spender inside. Wow, I am not sure if this should be all in one post, but if you can answer anything at all that would be great.

[ashber]

Or maybe I should just keep them, but if I do use them, then pay them off at the end of the month? But I feel like that's still too many cards for one person to have. Maybe, that's just me. With buying a house, won't that look like a bad thing? I guess I could ask in the mortgage section.

[creditwherecreditisdue]

Eliminate the balances - leave the cards alone unless they have an AF.

[MarineVietVet]

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@creditwherecreditisdue wrote:
Eliminate the balances - leave the cards alone unless they have an AF.

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I agree with this. I have 7 cards and it's quite manageable for me. What I do is have each of my cards set up to pay a recurring monthly bill with autopay so I don't have to remember which card to use this month to keep it active. You might try that.

If you get your utilization (total balances divided by total credit limits) on your revolving credit in order you will likely see an increase in your score.

Optimal credit utilization for FICO scoring purposes seems to be:
Total revolving utilization > 0 and < 9%, the lower the better, and
Reporting a balance on less than half of your revolving TL's, and
Reporting a balance on half or less of all TL's.

And remember to NEVER be late on any payment for any reason. Late payments are the kiss of death for high scoring.

From a BK years ago to:
7/09 TU-742 EQ- 779
8/09 TU-765 EQ- 783
9/09 EX pulled by lender 802

You can do the same thing with hard work.