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Ok so I just finished spending $500 on my Chase Freedom so i am eligible to get 10000 reward points which i can turn in for 100 dollars. I have been only using that one card and only for things that I would pay cash or my debit card for anyway. Mostly gas and cigarettes (ugly vice). I have not been holding a balance on any cards. I was tempted at first to charge up my cards but it is getting easier over time to just leave them. I just have to think about things differently. My credit lines are not my money. They are someone else money that is being dangled in front of me to be borrowed at a price. I leave all my cards in a different location from where I live so they are not physically close to me except for one which I have in my wallet in case of emergency. I rotate which one card that is and I try to make a token charge on each every month or two. I have also been allowing each to generate a statement with a small balance also just so they are all reporting periodically to my credit reports as being active... I am still gardening and I go to the gardening thread for inspiration to not apply for anything else and to not go into debt. I am in the stage of the game where I just have to be patient and let time pass and my scores will improve. My negative account from Bank of America won't come off of my reports til the end of 2016 so that is when I am focussing my plans on. I am trying to have miinimal inquires by then and several healthy tradelines so that I can have a great credit score by then. Before that time I doubt i can get my scores much over 700. 700 would be awesome though because just a year ago I didn;t imagine that I would ever have good credit.
@sjt wrote:Thanks for sharing your journey!
Have you thought about applying for an Amex Charge? You can get it backdated.
Thank you for your suggestion. I did apply for Amex charge cards but was rejected. I plan to try again once my scores move higher. I really don't like credit cards and I am very happy to not have balances. I am using mine the minimum amount to keep them open and in good standing.
Monthly Walmart TU score for June.
gonna get back on the phone this week and start playing the "please may I have a CLI and could you please Soft Pull me for that?" game with all my cards....
I got an amex prepaid card a few weeks ago. i also called amex back after receiving a rejection letter from apping 2 months ago. She seemed to have no new info for me about credit but she informed me that I could reapply once a month.. I guess I called the wrong person at amex for recon. It is definately worth a try. Recon at Chase was such a process and was emotionally exhausting but successful... I decided that I should not reapply until my credit situation changes a bit because my scores are essentially the same as when I applied. I mean maybe they are up 5 points. My experian report has 5 inquires on it now which is the most of any of my reports. The other 2 have 3 inquiries each... 5 isn't a lot but it is getting up there.
@dddewdrop wrote:I got an amex prepaid card a few weeks ago. i also called amex back after receiving a rejection letter from apping 2 months ago. She seemed to have no new info for me about credit but she informed me that I could reapply once a month.. I guess I called the wrong person at amex for recon. It is definately worth a try. Recon at Chase was such a process and was emotionally exhausting but successful... I decided that I should not reapply until my credit situation changes a bit because my scores are essentially the same as when I applied. I mean maybe they are up 5 points. My experian report has 5 inquires on it now which is the most of any of my reports. The other 2 have 3 inquiries each... 5 isn't a lot but it is getting up there.
What was the reason for the denial?
I dont have th
@sjt wrote:
@dddewdrop wrote:I got an amex prepaid card a few weeks ago. i also called amex back after receiving a rejection letter from apping 2 months ago. She seemed to have no new info for me about credit but she informed me that I could reapply once a month.. I guess I called the wrong person aamex for recon. It is definately worth a try. Recon at Chase was such a process and was emotionally exhausting but successful... I decided that I should not reapply until my credit situation changes a bit because my scores are essentially the same as when I applied. I mean maybe they are up 5 points. My experian report has 5 inquires on it now which is the most of any of my reports. The other 2 have 3 inquiries each... 5 isn't a lot but it is getting up there.
What was the reason for the denial?
I don't have the letter on me. I have to go check it as it is in storage at my folks house but I belive it was something along the lines of :
You have a serious delinquency (60 days past due or greater) or a derogatory description on your credit report.
with a " you have too many inquires" thrown in for good measure. i will go back and find the letter and update rhis post if my memory failed me on this one... Thanks for your input and support and good luck to you sjt.
I'm curious about your luck with getting approved with Amex by going the prepaid card route. They offered that to me as an option earlier this year when I applied and was denied (prior to finding this forum) and again after a denial a few weeks ago. I want the Delta Skymiles Gold card and considered going the prepaid route but want it to be worth it. How often do you think you will use it? I was thinking about using it to put money on for the online games I play. It's not a huge amount of money but I wonder if it will be significant enough to develop a relationship with Amex so that I can get approved for the Delta card.
@startnow wrote:I'm curious about your luck with getting approved with Amex by going the prepaid card route. They offered that to me as an option earlier this year when I applied and was denied (prior to finding this forum) and again after a denial a few weeks ago. I want the Delta Skymiles Gold card and considered going the prepaid route but want it to be worth it. How often do you think you will use it? I was thinking about using it to put money on for the online games I play. It's not a huge amount of money but I wonder if it will be significant enough to develop a relationship with Amex so that I can get approved for the Delta card.
They used to have a program called "Make Your Move" which was if you use your prepaid card on a regular basis you could be sent an invitation. They stopped this program as I think people intrepid as a guaranty. I think having a prepaid and using it consistently can help.
I pressed the luv button on my Walmart card after 4 month and was instantly approved for a CLI up to $600. Woot!