Both BOA cards are secured one was with a $500 limit and a $99 deposit, the other with a $300 limit, all my funds and I can always add money to make it an even $500. In fact I planned on adding money each week to the WAMU account, as that's how I'm paid and it's immediate since I bank with them. Boa was going to pull EXP, and that has 10 inquiries, and they claimed that was too many for them before. Both cards have an "insane" APR (to me) but it's what a subprimer deals with. I have no plans on carrying a balance on any of them, for the entire time I have them. Just to explain what I mean, I have all the amounts in my savings account for each cc I have including citi, so if I ever got to a point where I needed to carry a balance, I wouldn't because the money is in savings, if that makes sense. When I knew I'd have to get a secured, I saved double what I wanted as a limit.
Also I'll graduate sooner with BOA than with WAMU, which claims it's 15 months to graduate, or around that time. All I want is my scores to go up for the end result, the immediate effects are of no real concern as I don't want any more credit.
I can always ask my parents to co-sign a card with me, not just the whole AU thing, they've offered. My dad did tell me if I beat him at chess he'd make an AU on his Amex black/centurian card - again not interested. I loathe credit, once you live with out it, and learn to save and put things in investments, you see it for what it is -- something I was completely unaware of 7 years ago. When I had Amex it was the only card I liked, because I had a charge card, where I spent only what I could afford.