topic Re: Finally in with CHASE!!!! Question about 5/24.... in Credit Card Approvals

Finally in with CHASE!!!! Question about 5/24....

JJ1300 — Fri, 24 Jan 2025 04:58:04 GMT

So, it's been a loooooong journey. I started down in the 400's and thanks to both discovering the Godsend of Bill Pay with my Credit Union and these message boards, I have pulled myself up into the 700's for the second time. Last time, I had hit a plateau because I still had a bankruptcy and the late payments associated with a foreclosure that were still hanging around like a late party go'er that doesn't figure out the party's over.

I also got a little excited over my new found success and responsible credit behavior and racked up some pretty decent debt raising my Utilization to +-70% at its highest. I wasn't having any trouble paying because finances have improved. I eventually shook myself out of it and curbed the spend. My scores dipped back down into just above the mid 600's and I wasn't concerned because I had no pressing need for a mortgage, etc.

I finally got in with JetBlue Plus just less than 2 years ago after lowering my inquiries to get the nod from Barclays. Barclays issues Jetblue and is highly inquiry sensitive. The Recon guy himself told me "Wait 6 months and call back. I see you have 2 inquiries that will drop off by then and you will likely be good at that point". I waited and he was correct! JetBlue Plus! That was a milestone card because better finances has opened up traveling for us and we fly only Jetblue. So the bennies were a big deal!

During this same time period I had graphed out my 5/24 status and knew I had a little time to wait. After I was clear of 5/24, I app'd once or twice with no luck. I gave up and gardened for about a year. Recently, I was successful in getting my last baddie and my BK off of Equifax 2 months early and now have a 100% clean profile!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I can't even belive it!!!!!!!!!!! What a long road!!!!!!!!!

I have recently been considering a personal loan and was close to taking one with BHG and then read some pretty bad reviews. Certain factors steered me away from taking a HELOC, so I decided to hit the 0% BT offers and do some pay down that way. I went on an app spree last night. I had a pre-selected offer from USAA Rate Advantage and applied and boom! 15K SL after being denied a year earlier! I then app'd with Citi Diamond Preferred becasue I was targeting 0% BT offers. Their approval was underwhelming at a 3K SL. Then all of a sudden I remembered Chase and decided it was now or never becasue I knew I was going to continue my app spree a bit. So I pulled the trigger on Chase Freedom Unlimited and boom! I'm in at 8K SL! Then I figured I'd roll the dice with AMEX. I have app'd many times in my life but never been succesful. IN with AMEX/Blue Cash Everyday at 10K SL!!!! Today I realized I still needed to re-open my care credit (for upcoming dental expenses) that closed on me due to lack of use. I app'd and what was a 12K line that closed a year or so ago brought me back in at 16.5K SL!

Along the way, since I was taking some inquiry hits, I figured now was the time to try some CLI's on hard pull cards.

Results

Home Depot/$2501 to $17500.

NavyFed Cash Rewards/$6100 to $12100.

NavyFed More Rewards/$9000 to $11400.

The day before I went on the app spree, I hit up my Synchrony cards for CLI's while my CR's were frozen.

Results

Synchrony Home/$5200 to $8000

Synchrony Mastercard/$5230 to $8000

Discount Tire/$4000 to $5000

New Cards

Chase Freedom Unlimited $8,000

USAA Rate Advantage $15,000

AMEX Blue Cash Everuyday $10,000

Citi Diamond Preferred $3000

CareCredit $16500

I dropped my utilization from 65% to 38% by opening the new cards and the CLI's!!!! I have room to do about 28K in BT's to the new cards. That will wipe away all the high interest cards and leave me with only 1 card over 20% (20.74) The cards with the highest balances have rates from 15-18%. I will have room to move some off each of these to lower the individual Utilization. So all in all, once these new moves get reported and I expect some pretty decent score increases. If I remember from the past, I swear overall utilization drop saw a more marked score increase even though there some individually high utilization %'s. Right now I stand at EQ 710, TU 709, EX 701. Hoping for about a 25 point jump. We'll see!

Ok, now if you've made it this far.....my big question is this. For those of you that counted, I opened 5 cards between yesterday and today and Jetblue Plus is still within 5/24 until May. What are the chances Chase takes AA and closes the Chase Freedom Unlimited on me? Anybody have any similar experience?

Oh, and I'm definitely back in the Garden at least for Revolvers!!!! (If mortgage rates drop, I may refinance one of my mortgages. I also may consider a personal loan to move some of this revolving debt to a fixed rate and longer term so that I can attack the credit cards aggresively)

Re: Finally in with CHASE!!!! Question about 5/24....

Realist — Fri, 24 Jan 2025 05:43:19 GMT

Well done.

You went on a spree that ultimately benefited you, abusing your credit score to maximum potential and opportunity. What did it cost you? A number of hard inquiries, that are available for a reset over time. Yet, it increased your credit standing, position, reallocation of utilization, and likely score.

You won't likely lose anything in regards to Chase pulling a card. Instead what you will likely experience is that most if not all instituations will close you off while you hold six hard inquiries on record, if you pulled a sixth. As mentioned in my prior posts, there are always exceptions, but six inquiries close a LOT of doors. I've said before, if you don't think it does, feel free to apply around to test that statement. I know I always did, standing at an excellent FICO at that time. Denied. Denied. Denied. More Denied. It's like the ultimate in "You SHALL not pass" criteria.

Enjoy the fruits of your labor. Take a breather. Come back again just as strong, and in time. That time may be six months, twelve months, or even the full two years.

Re: Finally in with CHASE!!!! Question about 5/24....

IcyCool7227 — Fri, 24 Jan 2025 10:23:17 GMT

I don't understand why you have scores in the early 700s yet were approved for higher SLs with a bad history that is now off your reports. Not sure if a mortgage has anything to do with it and of course none of the issuers recently were mine except for Citi but that's a different card. I'd love to go on an app spree like you but the ones I want - I just cannot afford the third SUB from Amex and cashback match bonus from Discover while I use the first two cards to meet theirs. Is 11 cards total what you have now or are there others? In the future apply for CLIs before apping as they will see the HPs.

Re: Finally in with CHASE!!!! Question about 5/24....

SpaceCityCCuser — Fri, 24 Jan 2025 15:30:21 GMT

A good rule of thumb for BT cards is only use max 50% of the limit for BT. Using more than that will negatively affect your credit score. 30% is even better but 50% max.

Re: Finally in with CHASE!!!! Question about 5/24....

StrongerReturn2018 — Fri, 24 Jan 2025 16:52:37 GMT

Congratulations!

Re: Finally in with CHASE!!!! Question about 5/24....

CreditCuriosity — Fri, 24 Jan 2025 17:12:18 GMT

Congrats on your successes. You would of likely done a lot better for a 0% CC than the citi with a credit union or likely WF's or something along those lines but what is done is done as citi isn't known to give big limits out of the gate. Time to garden for some time and pay down the debt you mentioned. Enjoy.

Re: Finally in with CHASE!!!! Question about 5/24....

firefox100 — Fri, 24 Jan 2025 17:44:24 GMT

Nice on on your approvals, I hope that Chase does not close your new account they soft pull you about 15 days after opening new account.

Re: Finally in with CHASE!!!! Question about 5/24....

cashorcharge — Sat, 25 Jan 2025 00:47:32 GMT

That’s Terrific!! Congratulations on all your Approvals!!👏🏼🍾🥂

Re: Finally in with CHASE!!!! Question about 5/24....

StrongerReturn2018 — Sat, 25 Jan 2025 05:09:41 GMT

Well done! Especially that USAA approval. 👏

Re: Finally in with CHASE!!!! Question about 5/24....

IcyCool7227 — Sat, 25 Jan 2025 05:16:07 GMT

@CreditCuriosity wrote:
Congrats on your successes. You would of likely done a lot better for a 0% CC than the citi with a credit union or likely WF's or something along those lines but what is done is done as citi isn't known to give big limits out of the gate. Time to garden for some time and pay down the debt you mentioned. Enjoy.

I understand what you're saying but in my situation I consider an $8k a big SL from Citi. That's the highest I have ever gotten as a SL!

Re: Finally in with CHASE!!!! Question about 5/24....

CreditAggie — Mon, 27 Jan 2025 02:32:27 GMT

Congratulations on your approvals!

Re: Finally in with CHASE!!!! Question about 5/24....

sjt — Mon, 27 Jan 2025 16:59:51 GMT

Congrats.

Regarding Chase soft pulls, I would make sure that 1) You keep low utilization, 2) Pay your Cahse Card in full, and 3) Don't apply for any more credit for at least 6 months.

Re: Finally in with CHASE!!!! Question about 5/24....

cashorcharge — Mon, 27 Jan 2025 22:48:42 GMT

That’s Terrific!! Congratulations on your Approval!!👏🏼🍾🥂

Re: Finally in with CHASE!!!! Question about 5/24....

JJ1300 — Mon, 27 Jan 2025 23:32:25 GMT

I'm not sure exactly what you mean by this "I don't understand why you have scores in the early 700s yet were approved for higher SLs with a bad history that is now off your reports." That bad history is just that, history. So it wasn't used as part of any of these recent credit determinations. My scores were in the mid to upper 7's previously and I have had some cards with 17-25K lines for quite awhile now. I'm guessing that may have played a role. My income is also 300K+, so I'm guessing that could play a role too. I currently have 31 open revolvers reporting with about a dozen of those showing balances. I also have 5 closed revolvers that are reporting. I have 2 open primary mortgages, a closed mortgage from a refi and a paid off HELOC. I also have 18 installment loans reporting (14 paid off and 4 open). Synchrony tends to give high limits once you establish a relationship with them, especially Lowe's and CareCredit. Penfed and NavyFed. Citi has always been stingy. I was shocked when Home Depot (Citi) increased to 17,500. Synchrony also is the Queen of soft pulls. Freezing your credit (just in case) and requesting CLI's periodically on all your synchrony accounts is a great strategy.

Last, I actualy DID do my soft pulls with Synchrony and tried a few others BEFORE unfreezing my credit reports.

Re: Finally in with CHASE!!!! Question about 5/24....

JJ1300 — Mon, 27 Jan 2025 23:38:02 GMT

Unfortunately, that won't allow me to make the type of headway that I need to. My overall utilization will be under 39% now. I am simply going to go from paying off several cards that are high UTI % and a few others that aren't and end up with 4 that are high UTI % but will be 0% interest and will have quickly declining balances as a result. The effect of this will ultimately bring me down to under the magic 29% UTI and eventually maybe even the ever so more magic 9% UTI.

Re: Finally in with CHASE!!!! Question about 5/24....

JJ1300 — Mon, 27 Jan 2025 23:40:40 GMT

This is one area that I know I missed on. Had I done my usual boatload of research ahead of time, maybe I would have gone that way. Unfortunately, although this was planned in some regards, it was spontaneous in other respects. I may well do some more BT down the road and this will certainly be something I will try and remember.

Re: Finally in with CHASE!!!! Question about 5/24....

JJ1300 — Mon, 27 Jan 2025 23:41:22 GMT

Fingers crossed! They are already processing my BT, so hopefully not!

Re: Finally in with CHASE!!!! Question about 5/24....

JJ1300 — Mon, 27 Jan 2025 23:42:47 GMT

Right?! I thought they had me on a blacklist....lol. Well, they actually likely DID have me on the BK blacklist...but it's gone now. See ya!!!!

Re: Finally in with CHASE!!!! Question about 5/24....

JJ1300 — Mon, 27 Jan 2025 23:44:13 GMT

The $8,000 SL was on Chase. Citi was their usuall stingy self at $3,000. Although, they showed me some love on the Home Depot CLI!

Re: Finally in with CHASE!!!! Question about 5/24....

JJ1300 — Mon, 27 Jan 2025 23:46:47 GMT

#2 isn't possible, since I'm utilizing the BT offer. I will be making large payments on all of these 0% BT balances but I will make sure to focus a little heavier on Chase when I can.