I am working hard to pay down these credit cards but I need money for a surgery and am looking to get a lower interest rate loan for it instead of maxing out some of these high interest credit cards. I need to maximize my credit score for a loan soon so I need help with this scenario.
I have the following credit cards:
Card - Limit - Balance - % utilization
A - 3,200 - 2,258 - 71%
B - 4,000 - 0 - 0%
C - 3,300 - 1,547 - 47%
D - 2,000 - 1,256 - 63%
E - 4,000 - 2,626 - 66%
F - 5,000 - 3,604 - 72%
- - -
TOTAL - 11,291 - 21,500 - 53%
I check my credit using Experian and Credit Karma and they seem to indicated that having a revolving card balance of over 50% is bringing my score down (about 674 currently). Does this mean the entire balance or per card?
Would it be better to pay off two cards and have the remaining cards above the 50% threshold? Or would it better to bring them all down a bit to below the 50% threshold?
My thought is to use cash and transfer of funds from card to card to do something like this:
Card - Limit - Balance - % utilization
A - 3,200 - 0 - 0%
B - 4,000 - 0 - 0%
C - 3,300 - 1,547 - 47%
D - 2,000 - 1,256 - 45%
E - 4,000 - 3,126 - 78%
F - 5,000 - 4,104 - 82%
- - -
TOTAL - 9,677 - 21,500 - 45%
Or this:
Card - Limit - Balance - % utilization
A - 3,200 - 1,500 - 47%
B - 4,000 - 0 - 0%
C - 3,300 - 1,547 - 47%
D - 2,000 - 900 - 45%
E - 4,000 - 1,900 - 48%
F - 5,000 - 3,604 - 72%
- - -
TOTAL - 9,451 - 21,500 - 44%
Which optoin would look better to a potential creditor?
