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Not too bad. I wish they would be will to remove the AF or upgrade my BB Card because I got over 200 in BB Bucks this year, and also am a premier silver member. HSBC sucks and I know Cap one wont remove the AF, the only 2 cards I have with AF are with HSBC BBRZMC and Orchard Bank cards.
I have about 15 open CCs reporting. Why so many? In my case it was due to my early days in credit rebuilding in that I applied for anything and everything just to get my first CC to report. I did too much settling and instead of being more selective so as to be more effective, I received cards I immediately wanted to cancel due to AFs, and so on. Wish I proceeded more slowly. All but one is shelved (Amex) and looking to let a few die a natural death in the next few months due to non-use. In fact, I'm going through a financial challenge so I'm not using any CC at the moment; cash only for us. CCs are never an emergency fund.
Target gives 5% or more at register, IMO, that big enough reward to justify it.
AMEX ( not everyone loves it).
For me, about 10 to 15 is more than enough.
@visorboy1974 wrote:
@flyingmd wrote:
Personally, I think too many cards is an invitation to financial disaster. WRONGI wouldn't say it's the number of cards as much as it is the amount of credit. WRONG
@wmarat wrote:
@visorboy1974 wrote:
@flyingmd wrote:
Personally, I think too many cards is an invitation to financial disaster. WRONGI wouldn't say it's the number of cards as much as it is the amount of credit. WRONG
lol, don't hold back there.
If someone isn't financially disciplined, I agree that having lots of cards/ lots of available credit can be risky. It's like sending a dieter into a chocolate factory. And this is something that should be acknowledged frequently on this board, because we do see people who went overboard and are paying the price.
But if you're not tempted to buy things that you can't pay off right away, lots of cards/ lots of credit are just that, lots. To me it has become a bit of a PITA to keep track of my 8 or 10 or whatever it is, but I haven't come up with any particular reason to close them. I just use 3 or 4 at a time for most of my financial business and air the others out every now and again.
In terms of scoring, 3 cards seems to be the magic number, unless you have lots of open loans, in which case you might "need" more to avoid the "too many accounts with balances" ding.
In terms of real-life usage, 2 is an absolute minimum, and 3 or 4 is better, because you never know when the CCC will go nuts on you and reduce your CL or close you out, or a card processing network will go down, or there's a screw-up in your payment and you can't use your card until it's untangled or whatever. That's when you don't want to have only BofA, or only AmEx, or only VISA's, or whatever.
In terms of rewards, evaluate your use of money and see what cards can pay you back some of your hard-earned cash, and go with those. And realize that just about the time you have the perfect collection of rewards cards, they'll start changing the rewards.
I only have two cc's, both from the same bank, with more than enough of a cl for me. I only use one cc, I like my life simple, and I am not a score junky, as you can see from my scores.
I really love this post. I'm DYING to get a credit card with some legitimacy. I can't wait for this house to close so I can move on and up. I'm very interested on which cards offer the best "rewards." I'm definitely not going to collect cards though because I'm too lazy to take care of it all.
so would it be advantagous to have say - a MC, AMEX, Visa, Discover group all from different banks so that if one bank got upset, you could depend on the others? Or do y'all have multiple MC, Visa ,etc rather than a spread of different types?
How many cards actually get carried around every day? Or do you take the one with the reward you want (ie, getting gas? get the gas CC)
I am rebuilding, and I have two credit cards now, a $500 mastercard from my CU and a Discover cash back one with 4,000 cl. That's a victory for me. I pay in full every month, although I'm planning to use my Discover for a big-ish purchase (for which I will pay off during the interest-free period).
Does having a 3d one really matter that much? I wouldn't mind having a VISA for diversification . . .