EX DOWN 1 pt

[Anonymous]

My bank would give me a loan but they pull all 3 scores for an unsecured loan....sigh........It seems my life revolves around inquiries.

[Barry]

Please be clear, everyone, that I do not recommend this...

Barry

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CreditBob wrote:

I mentioned this in the last response. The fico score looks at two different things. One, the overall utilization of all revolving balances combined together. Second, the utilization of each revolving account. You do not need to do this every month. Try it just this once of leaving a balance on all six cards. PUll your score & see what happens. Then just back to how you were doing leaving balances back to zero just like you are doing now.

I went through this myself and after talking with Barry he had told me about it. So it worked.

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[haulingthescoreup]

Your CCC should mark your account as recently active when it updates to the CRA's each month. We might not be able to see this designation on reports, but the scoring formula "knows" if an account is active or inactive, even if it reports a $0 balance month after month after month.

In fact, if you spend a lot that month, more than you ever have before, you should see your "highest balance" figure change on your reports. I had a highest balance of $11K or so show up, even though the reported balance was still $0.

[Anonymous]

Ok, so I have come into this discussion late, and am unclear as to the bottom line.

We have heard, over many months and posts about this subject, that having balances on less than 50% of your open accounts is very good.   I have even heard further that keeping only 1 revolving line reporting a balance is optimal, since you want your utilization to be less than 10%, but at least 1% (i.e. not 0%) to max out the UTIL portion of the score.

Several of us have actually applied for more cards just to be sure we can reasonably get below 50% of accounts with balances being reported.

Now Credit Bob is saying (correct me please if I heard it wrong) that we should keep balances on all open TL's?   What?

Hauling or any other mods - can you clarify this?    I saw Barry's post but it really did not enlighten the subject much.

[haulingthescoreup]

Barry was saying that he did NOT agree with the quote attributed to him; in other words, that he does not recommend letting all accounts post balances.

[Anonymous]

Regarding my last post, do you agree with it, i.e. don't let more than half  your open TL's report?   And that any suggestion to carry balances on all cards will NOT maximize your scores?

[Anonymous]

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Boscoe wrote:

Regarding my last post, do you agree with it, i.e. don't let more than half  your open TL's report?   And that any suggestion to carry balances on all cards will NOT maximize your scores?

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FWIW, the general consensus is to make sure you have a balance on fewer than half of all open accounts.  (This is not the same as "not more than half.")

In my experience, I saw score increases every time one additional TL reported a $0 balance, and the score increases continued until there was only one account with a balance.  This is why I now recommend letting a balance report on one and only one TL for the best FICO effect.  Of course, this is not possible for everyone, but in my experience, the fewer accounts with balances the better, keeping in mind to always have at least one revolving account with a balance.

[Anonymous]

As FICO's utilization section is a snapshot in time there is no need to carry a balance on only one card the majority of the time. Only when you know you will be applying for a loan or a hard to obtain credit card would I recommend worrying about how many cards are carrying a balance if you already carry below 50%.

[haulingthescoreup]

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@Anonymous wrote:

As FICO's utilization section is a snapshot in time there is no need to carry a balance on only one card the majority of the time. Only when you know you will be applying for a loan or a hard to obtain credit card would I recommend worrying about how many cards are carrying a balance if you already carry below 50%.

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Agreed, except that every now and then, something interesting pops up, and there's that built-in delay averaging a month to change reported util. But you're correct!

[Anonymous]

I rotate my cards making sure I use them at least one time every 3 months.  Especially HSBC since they a bit touchy lately.  I want to be the one closing this account.  There are some I use alot.

But what started this whole thing is that I can not get Equifax to move from 698.  It's been there for months.

I once payed all my cards to qero balances and my scores went down.