balance tranfer

[mor2000]

hi, after a long illness i am trying to take control of my finances again.  i appreciate any help that you could provide.  this is my situation (after working some time improving my score)

equifax score 756

My goal is to increase to 760 fast ...since i will be applying for a mortgage shortly.

cc    balance    credit limit

1      140           600

2      850           1000

3      300           2300

4      1700        7550

5      1502       3500

6      0              4000

My plan is to transfer 700 from cc2 to cc6,  and 400 from cc5 to cc6.  i do not want to close any of the cc because some are old and i think help the score.  by doing this i expect to bring each card under 34 per cent utl.  I also have 500 dollards that i can apply to any card.  do you think this will work? thank you so much for your help.

[GregB]

Look at your report. Are those 6 cards the only open revolving accounts? You probably will get the most increase by getting a zero balance reporting on at least half of your open accounts. Do you have other revolving showing as open accounts on your report?

Best use of $500 is to pay off 1 and 3 and put the rest on 2 to get it below 80%. Paying a BT fee to move money around seems likely to be a waste of money. or maybe more trouble than it is worth. Getting ONE score just over 760 won't guarantee a better mortgage as the score pulled by the lender may be slightly different and they may use you middle score or some other procedure.

Are you sure the EQ 756 is a FICO? Seems high unless you have long history and an ideal mix of other info reporting such as paid off installment and mortgage. This is based on 5 out of 6 accounts reporting a balance and the total utilization of revolving shown on your chart.

 Don't forget that you need the accounts reporting zero, which means that the statement has to generate and then they have to report to the CRAs. This might take some time as some CC Companies don't report promptly or reliably. Amex is a good example.

[mor2000]

thank you for your help.  i took my score from "my fico score"(this site), i hope this is the right one.  i also have a loan and that is all i have.  my credit history  is quite long but never a mortgage...hope will have one(mortgage) soon.

again thank you.

[GregB]

That is very encouraging. You must have substantial positive credit info such as long credit history, no negatives reporting, etc. to have that good a score with that utilization and number of accounts with balances. Making sure you have no accounts maxed out, which I believe is 80%+ utilization on that account, will help. Making sure you have at least half your open accounts reporting zero balance will also help. Ideally all but one of your accounts would show zero balance but that is not likely to happen soon.

You now have one real FICO. You also need to make sure that there are no surprises on the other two reports. The free way is to use annualcreditreport.com and pull all three reports. Don't spend money on scores as they are all FAKOs. Make sure there are no surprises with one of the other two showing a negative that was not on the report you already pulled here. You could also get the other report/score at myFICO.com but you might as well wait until you get some accounts paid off. Don't forget they have to generate a statement and then a delay to report to the CRAs. Most CCs update on Experian in a day or two, TU and EQ take a few days longer.

Good Luck!

[mor2000]

yes it is very rewarding. will let you know how i do in a few months.

thanks!