SDFCU Secured loan/CC combo no longer working?

[Anonymous]

I am in the proccess of rebuilding and have been reading a lot on here, I recently got a USAA secured card, and an opensky secured card. I am trying to get 1 more card and a secured personal loan to give me the ideal 3 CC/1 installment combo. I've read on here that SDFCU is great for that, well I recently joined and it was a HP, I deposited $500 for the loan and once it showed up I called them (today) and found out that you can now only do 12 months, with 12 set payments of roughly $43 I believe. So if I wanted to do the ideal situation everyone has talked about and pay most of it down, say $400 and use it for a secured CC with them I'll obviously be left with $100, after 3 months of the $43 payments it'll be paid off and no longer reporting. Am I missing some sort of trick ro something? From everything I read here people said you can pay a big chunk of it down and then pay off the rest throughout the term of the loan? If it is no longer like that does anyone else know of a good CU that I can get a loan/CC with? Thanks for all input!

[Studio90x]

I believe you're confusing the Secured Loan technique in order to keep an installment loan for scoring purposes after major installment loans have been paid off.

With the SDFCU Secured loan/CC, you would deposit the $500 to the secured loan, take the funds from the secured loan to use as a deposit for the secured CC.

[Anonymous]

I am a little confused, I was under the impression that it worked like this pretty much:

A. Deposit $500 into savings account

B. Apply for $500 secured loan (12 months at about $43/month)

C. Immediately pay $440~ towards loan to leave a small balance

D. Use the $440 I receive back to get secured CC

E. Pay off remaining $60~ for next 12 months to have a nice payment history

From what she told me on the phone it doesn't work out that way. Once I reach the last step I will be required to make my set payment of $43 monthly, which will result in my loan being paid off after 2 months, I don't get the nice payment history and active installment loan I wanted. I currently have no installment loans, my last one was paid off September last year.

[Anonymous]

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@Anonymous wrote:

I am a little confused, I was under the impression that it worked like this pretty much:

A. Deposit $500 into savings account

B. Apply for $500 secured loan (12 months at about $43/month)

C. Immediately pay $440~ towards loan to leave a small balance

D. Use the $440 I receive back to get secured CC

E. Pay off remaining $60~ for next 12 months to have a nice payment history

From what she told me on the phone it doesn't work out that way. Once I reach the last step I will be required to make my set payment of $43 monthly, which will result in my loan being paid off after 2 months, I don't get the nice payment history and active installment loan I wanted. I currently have no installment loans, my last one was paid off September last year.

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While your desire is beneficial, I do not believe you can combine both of those two actions (at the same time, in the same action).

Usually one just gets a secured savings loan by itself, as a stand alone trade line.

There is a thread on this site about Alliant Credit Union (Illinois) and how to proceed by getting a 60 month secured savings account loan and paying off ~ 90% early for a very low utilization rate.

However, this is the first time I have heard of a combo card / loan.

Best Wishes

[Anonymous]

The SDFCU 'trick' does NOT involve prepaying the secured loan, just using the secured funds to open a secured CC. Alliant CU is the one you prepay.

[Anonymous]

Now it gets more confusing, yesterday the woman on the phone told me that the funds will only become available as i pay into the loan. Today I login to my account and see that the funds have been deposited into my savings, I now have $1000 in my savings account, $500 available, and I have my $500 loan with $0 available credit on it. I applied for the secured CC and got denied, so I called them and she said it's based off my credit report from the last 30 days, and also because I was trying to use the secured funds towards it and technically didn't have any secured funds to use? She was really confused also, I asked her why it shows I have $1000 now and $500 available if she's saying I don't have any until I start paying towards my loan, it got really quiet and awkward while she tried to figure out how to explain it, after about 45 seconds of her thinking to herself she then went on hold for a few minutes and came back telling me that I just cannot use secured funds for another secured product, I asked her if I could pay $250 towards my loan (minimum limit for CC) and use the funds towards the CC, she said yes then asked how I want to pay that off and I asked her if I could pay it with the funds I already have in my savings for the loan and it got quiet and awkward again and I just hung up honestly, got tired of dealing with it.

Sorry for all my rambling, but is there anyone here with experience on this issue that could chime in?

[Anonymous]

I became aware of the State Department FCU via information by Beverly Harzog. She has a list where she reviews: The Best (and Worst) Secured Credit Cards.

I became a member of State because of her  #2:  SDFCU  Savings Secured Visa Platinum Card recommendation.

However, the topic here is about a "combined Secured Credit Card / Secured Savings Account Loan". As I mentioned before (hopefully very politely), this was the first I heard of the concept. Which I think is great.

While I haven't applied yet to State for the secured visa, I am a member and have already funded a savings account as security for a future "secured visa".

Having browsed the SD FCU site, I can identify both Share Secured Loan and the Savings Secured Visa Platinum Card, but both as stand alone entities.

Would you be willing to share the origin of your understanding of the combined product?

Thanks in advance!

[Anonymous]

Sdfcu changed their policies this year. You can no longer pay the loan forward by that much on the 500$ secured loan. You can but they will cut the number of months down. I paid mine forward in February I think. My last payment was moved to July.