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Valued Contributor

Posts: 2,791

Registered: ‎03-18-2007

Re: Looking for tips on building credit for a 19 year old.

‎12-13-2008 08:30 AM

jmeek08 wrote:
I see many people saying to keep a small balance on the cards. Why do we want to keep a balance? Use it for a while yes and PIF every month and NEVER pay a penny in interest is the way to go to me.

jmeek, if you read those comments again more closely, you'll likely see that authors aren't recommending "keeping a small balance on the cards", they're recommending letting some cards report a small balance - then PIFing the rest immediately after the reporting to avoid interest charges.

General consensus on here has found that controlling one's REPORTED balances (which is very different from 'carrying balances') and allowing a reported util of 1%-9% on one's CR's seems to give higher FICO scores than having all zero balances reporting.

_____________________________________________________________________________
It's never too late to become the person you might have been. ~George Eliot

02/12/09 EX: 701 / 02/08/10 EQ: 719 / 02/08/10 TU: 723

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