Trimming the fat/what to do about Amex?

[Gunnar419]

Many good points, folks. Thank you.

As to grocery rewards, I don't buy most of my groceries at Costco because it's not local. I go there only about every six weeks for bulk purchases because it's an hour away from where I live. And with the local grocers not taking Amex, the Sallie Mae is "it" for an everyday grocery card. Since I'm single, though, that one grocery card is plenty.

On earlier points:

It does stand to reason that if Amex axes the TE they'd replace it with something else, and as LTL says, in a way there's no harm giving up Amex anyhow, just because future cards will always backdate. Boy it would feel BAD, though!

As to my spending habits, I put maybe $500-$600 a month on cards except occasional larger spends for home improvement. My spending mostly includes everyday expenses and online shopping, mostly Amazon and eBay. No luxury goods, almost no travel, no department store shopping. I generally PIF, except for the home improvement expenses, which I usually BT to get zero interest.

[longtimelurker]

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@Anonymous wrote:
What is the harm in keeping the Freedom? No AF and its there in case another lender decides to AA.

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Because OP wants to reduce # of cards and total CL

[Anonymous]

Meh.

[kdm31091]

There's no point in keeping a card you won't use other than util and AAOA, which do tend to be slightly overblown on these forums, I am not trying to start a war with anybody, but a lot of people on here lean too far in the "don't ever close anything" direction. If a card is no longer useful to you, and you are getting nothing out of it, just get rid of it. It's still on your report for ten years anyway, so it still is a positive account no matter what. You are not bound for life to keep every single credit card that you open. Your credit score is not going to tank 100 points for closing one card. Unless of course you only have one card. lol

You have to do what is best for you. If you never closed anything, you would end up with many, many accounts to track. Even if you are not using them, you still have to make sure there are no fradualent charges, etc, and why do all this for something that offers you no benefit other than maybe a few more points on your score?

When the subject of the thread of trimming the fat, I imagine the OP is not someone who wants to keep cards just for the sake of keeping them. Many people are totally fine with just keeping cards because they do not want to close them, but I am of the opinion that if it's doing nothing for you, there's no reason to keep it. Freedom and Discover IT are largely unnessacary to both have. Some will disagree but that's my experience.

If you are truly worried about util being a problem if you close the card, try and get a CLI or two on some of your other cards. This will help that issue. But there is no reason to keep something that doesn't benefit you anymore.

[Gunnar419]

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@Anonymous wrote:
What is the harm in keeping the Freedom? No AF and its there in case another lender decides to AA.

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There's no harm in keeping the Freedom, but I'm one of those people who doesn't like to have to worry about cards I'm not using or go out of the way to keep some small expense on a card to keep the lender from closing it for inactivity.

Also, my overall credit is so high compared with my income that if I did want to get another card someday (most likely a Home Depot card for my home improvement expenses or a Chase Slate for balance transfers), I think I need to lower my total exposure to avoid being denied or given some CL that's too small to be useful.

I have considered eventually PCing the Freedom to a Slate, but since I don't need a Slate right now (having great BT terms from Sallie Mae), it would still just be one more card to manage.

[Gunnar419]

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@kdm31091 wrote:

There's no point in keeping a card you won't use other than util and AAOA, which do tend to be slightly overblown on these forums, I am not trying to start a war with anybody, but a lot of people on here lean too far in the "don't ever close anything" direction. If a card is no longer useful to you, and you are getting nothing out of it, just get rid of it. It's still on your report for ten years anyway, so it still is a positive account no matter what. You are not bound for life to keep every single credit card that you open. Your credit score is not going to tank 100 points for closing one card. Unless of course you only have one card. lol

You have to do what is best for you. If you never closed anything, you would end up with many, many accounts to track. Even if you are not using them, you still have to make sure there are no fradualent charges, etc, and why do all this for something that offers you no benefit other than maybe a few more points on your score?

When the subject of the thread of trimming the fat, I imagine the OP is not someone who wants to keep cards just for the sake of keeping them. Many people are totally fine with just keeping cards because they do not want to close them, but I am of the opinion that if it's doing nothing for you, there's no reason to keep it. Freedom and Discover IT are largely unnessacary to both have. Some will disagree but that's my experience.

If you are truly worried about util being a problem if you close the card, try and get a CLI or two on some of your other cards. This will help that issue. But there is no reason to keep something that doesn't benefit you anymore.

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Thanks, kdm. You understand exactly.

[Gunnar419]

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@chwebb1 wrote:

I like the idea of keeping at least one AMEX open (which is what you're doing with the TE), so if you really have no use for the BCE, absolutely axe it. Just keep in mind that if you have any gadgets you bought on it for the extended warranty, I believe that most cards will not honor the warranty if you close the card, although I could be wrong.

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Good point about warranties. I didn't know that.

[NRB525]

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@Gunnar419 wrote:

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@Anonymous wrote:
What is the harm in keeping the Freedom? No AF and its there in case another lender decides to AA.

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There's no harm in keeping the Freedom, but I'm one of those people who doesn't like to have to worry about cards I'm not using or go out of the way to keep some small expense on a card to keep the lender from closing it for inactivity.

Also, my overall credit is so high compared with my income that if I did want to get another card someday (most likely a Home Depot card for my home improvement expenses or a Chase Slate for balance transfers), I think I need to lower my total exposure to avoid being denied or given some CL that's too small to be useful.

I have considered eventually PCing the Freedom to a Slate, but since I don't need a Slate right now (having great BT terms from Sallie Mae), it would still just be one more card to manage.

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The thing about these cards is, when you have them open for a long time period, they keep adding positives to your credit history, with that bank in particular. If you do app for a Slate later on, your recent actual history with Chase, even if only a few charges per year, is a large positive. Worst case, you have the $7k on the Freedom, if they give you a $500 Slate (not likely) then you can transfer the CL to the Slate and move forward with that. More likely, though, is you get a healthy line with the Slate also.

Closing no-AF cards is not something to take lightly, there's just no downside to keeping them open.

You are free to close them, but I wouldn't.

[kdm31091]

There is a downside to keeping them open. One more account to track and manage. Some people don't see that as a downside, but some don't want to track 20 different accounts that they have. It becomes overwhelming.

Yes, you "just have to charge something little" on it every so often to keep it active, and watch it for fraud, but why would you want to do all that for something that is no longer benefitting you? For a couple points on a score?

You can close an account AND still have a good score. You do not have to feel like you are never allowed to do it. It's not like you are declaring bankruptcy or missing a payment. It's not that big of a deal.

[TRC_WA]

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@kdm31091 wrote:

There is a downside to keeping them open. One more account to track and manage. Some people don't see that as a downside, but some don't want to track 20 different accounts that they have. It becomes overwhelming.

Yes, you "just have to charge something little" on it every so often to keep it active, and watch it for fraud, but why would you want to do all that for something that is no longer benefitting you? For a couple points on a score?

You can close an account AND still have a good score. You do not have to feel like you are never allowed to do it. It's not like you are declaring bankruptcy or missing a payment. It's not that big of a deal.

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Agreed.  I was just approved for Sallie Mae.

I closed my Barclay Apple and moved the $2200 CL over... and also closed my 76 and Chevron gas cards.  They will never be used again now that I have Sallie Mae and I don't want to track cards I don't use.