topic Re: Debt/Credit Ratio in Credit Cards

Debt/Credit Ratio

kal9988 — Fri, 02 Jan 2015 01:48:25 GMT

If I have one credit card with $9,500 on it with a $10,000 limit, and a second card with $14,500 on it with a $15,000 limit, and I have $10k that I can use towards paying them. Does it make sense to pay $5k on each, or $10k on one? In other words, does the debt/credit ratio part of my FICO score care about each individual card or just the overall debt/credit from all my cards combined? Thanks!

Re: Debt/Credit Ratio

Anonymous — Fri, 02 Jan 2015 01:53:03 GMT

@kal9988 wrote:
If I have one credit card with $9,500 on it with a $10,000 limit, and a second card with $14,500 on it with a $15,000 limit, and I have $10k that I can use towards paying them. Does it make sense to pay $5k on each, or $10k on one? In other words, does the debt/credit ratio part of my FICO score care about each individual card or just the overall debt/credit from all my cards combined? Thanks!

Interest rate?

Re: Debt/Credit Ratio

CreditCuriosity — Fri, 02 Jan 2015 01:56:07 GMT

@kal9988 wrote:
If I have one credit card with $9,500 on it with a $10,000 limit, and a second card with $14,500 on it with a $15,000 limit, and I have $10k that I can use towards paying them. Does it make sense to pay $5k on each, or $10k on one? In other words, does the debt/credit ratio part of my FICO score care about each individual card or just the overall debt/credit from all my cards combined? Thanks!

IMO pay down the 10k limit down to under 30% utilization so approx so pay 7k on that and put the other towards the 15k being the remaing 3k. That would put your utilization at 76% vs. maxed out.. Obviously interest rates come into play as well, so more info might be handy... You are essentially maxed on both cards, so kinda not good... Or if you want to get another CC and do a BT then you might want to pay like 5k on each to get utilization down so you might get approved for a 0% BT card for 15 months or whatever... Curious what others advise is here.. Never been in your situation.. Good luck

I think interest will be your biggest thing on your choice though, but deffinetly would suggest a BT card in the long run..

Re: Debt/Credit Ratio

Anonymous — Fri, 02 Jan 2015 01:56:55 GMT

@CreditCuriousity wrote:
@kal9988 wrote:
If I have one credit card with $9,500 on it with a $10,000 limit, and a second card with $14,500 on it with a $15,000 limit, and I have $10k that I can use towards paying them. Does it make sense to pay $5k on each, or $10k on one? In other words, does the debt/credit ratio part of my FICO score care about each individual card or just the overall debt/credit from all my cards combined? Thanks!
IMO pay down the 10k limit down to under 30% utilization so approx so pay 7k on that and put the other towards the 15k being the remaing 3k. That would put your utilization at 76% vs. maxed out.. Obviously interest rates come into play as well, so more info might be handy... You are essentially maxed on both cards, so kinda not good... Or if you want to get another CC and do a BT then you might want to pay like 5k on each to get utilization down so you might get approved for a 0% BT card for 15 months or whatever... Curious what others advise is here.. Never been in your situation.. Good luck

I think interest will be your biggest thing on your choice though, but deffinetly would suggest a BT card in the long run..

I'd like to see interest rates to give advice on the matter.

Re: Debt/Credit Ratio

NRB525 — Fri, 02 Jan 2015 02:00:25 GMT

@Anonymous wrote:
@CreditCuriousity wrote:
@kal9988 wrote:
If I have one credit card with $9,500 on it with a $10,000 limit, and a second card with $14,500 on it with a $15,000 limit, and I have $10k that I can use towards paying them. Does it make sense to pay $5k on each, or $10k on one? In other words, does the debt/credit ratio part of my FICO score care about each individual card or just the overall debt/credit from all my cards combined? Thanks!
IMO pay down the 10k limit down to under 30% utilization so approx so pay 7k on that and put the other towards the 15k being the remaing 3k. That would put your utilization at 76% vs. maxed out.. Obviously interest rates come into play as well, so more info might be handy... You are essentially maxed on both cards, so kinda not good... Or if you want to get another CC and do a BT then you might want to pay like 5k on each to get utilization down so you might get approved for a 0% BT card for 15 months or whatever... Curious what others advise is here.. Never been in your situation.. Good luck

I think interest will be your biggest thing on your choice though, but deffinetly would suggest a BT card in the long run..
I'd like to see interest rates to give advice on the matter.

OP, you are at the level of utilization where... utilization don't matter any more. What you want to do is first of all save interest expense. You have a journey ahead to pay down the cards, regardless, that will take time, you need to plan to save as much interest as possible so your next payments (after the $10k is paid out) are most effective to pay the remainders.

THEN you can start watching the utilization numbers.

Re: Debt/Credit Ratio

kal9988 — Fri, 02 Jan 2015 02:28:04 GMT

Sorry, both are on 0% offers for now. My goal is only on raising my score. Personally, I want to pay off one card at a time, just for the good feeling. If however getting both cards below 75% util per card makes a difference in my score, I'd want to know.

Re: Debt/Credit Ratio

Anonymous — Fri, 02 Jan 2015 02:29:22 GMT

@kal9988 wrote:
Sorry, both are on 0% offers for now. My goal is only on raising my score. Personally, I want to pay off one card at a time, just for the good feeling. If however getting both cards below 75% util per card makes a difference in my score, I'd want to know.

Okay, So let's start with this, Do both 0% offers end at the same time, Which one has the lowest APR after the promo?

Re: Debt/Credit Ratio

kal9988 — Fri, 02 Jan 2015 02:30:49 GMT

The goal is to get my score high enough that I can get another 0% card to transfer the balances to. The two offers end a month apart.

Re: Debt/Credit Ratio

Anonymous — Fri, 02 Jan 2015 02:34:31 GMT

@kal9988 wrote:
The goal is to get my score high enough that I can get another 0% card to transfer the balances to. The two offers end a month apart.

That's great and all, but even if you did an even split and paid 5.5K on the 14.5K balance and 4.5K on the 9.5K balance, You're still sitting at 60% and 50% utilization on the cards respectively. Your score will go up only marginally and I doubt you'll get another card with a good balance transfer offer for a limit that you are most likely seeking.

Re: Debt/Credit Ratio

kal9988 — Fri, 02 Jan 2015 02:35:54 GMT

How low would my overall debt to credit ratio need to be to get 0% offers again?

Re: Debt/Credit Ratio

Anonymous — Fri, 02 Jan 2015 02:37:53 GMT

@kal9988 wrote:
How low would my overall debt to credit ratio need to be to get 0% offers again?

What are your current FICO's?

I'd say below 30%, on both.

Re: Debt/Credit Ratio

CreditCuriosity — Fri, 02 Jan 2015 02:38:06 GMT

@Anonymous wrote:
@kal9988 wrote:
The goal is to get my score high enough that I can get another 0% card to transfer the balances to. The two offers end a month apart.
That's great and all, but even if you did an even split and paid 5.5K on the 14.5K balance and 4.5K on the 9.5K balance, You're still sitting at 60% and 50% utilization on the cards respectively. Your score will go up only marginally and I doubt you'll get another card with a good balance transfer offer for a limit that you are most likely seeking.

See if you are pre-qualified for the slate on the pre-qual site? Obviously don't apply until you have a plan as you are maxed on two cards and would get a crap limit

Re: Debt/Credit Ratio

TRC_WA — Fri, 02 Jan 2015 02:40:07 GMT

@kal9988 wrote:
The goal is to get my score high enough that I can get another 0% card to transfer the balances to. The two offers end a month apart.

That doesn't sound good at all...

A mess I'm glad I'm not in.

Re: Debt/Credit Ratio

CreditCuriosity — Fri, 02 Jan 2015 02:48:37 GMT

@TRC_WA wrote:
@kal9988 wrote:
The goal is to get my score high enough that I can get another 0% card to transfer the balances to. The two offers end a month apart.
That doesn't sound good at all...

A mess I'm glad I'm not in.

If however he decides to apply the first 10k the amount remaining isn't "HUGE" even if he doesn't get a 0% card again, it won't be fun to pay off and "huge" is a relative term compared to income so I guess it could hurt. Best of luck OP..

Re: Debt/Credit Ratio

Anonymous — Fri, 02 Jan 2015 02:47:34 GMT

@CreditCuriousity wrote:
@TRC_WA wrote:
@kal9988 wrote:
The goal is to get my score high enough that I can get another 0% card to transfer the balances to. The two offers end a month apart.
That doesn't sound good at all...

A mess I'm glad I'm not in.
10k isn't huge (well that term is relative to income, etc) , but deffinetly not going to be fun paying off if you can't get another 0% offer.

We don't know the OP's situation as of yet, so let's reserve judgement.

Re: Debt/Credit Ratio

Anonymous — Fri, 02 Jan 2015 02:48:13 GMT

@TRC_WA wrote:
@kal9988 wrote:
The goal is to get my score high enough that I can get another 0% card to transfer the balances to. The two offers end a month apart.
That doesn't sound good at all...

A mess I'm glad I'm not in.

Thanks TRC_WA, this is the kind of useful information members come here looking for.

Re: Debt/Credit Ratio

CreditCuriosity — Fri, 02 Jan 2015 02:50:23 GMT

@Anonymous wrote:
@CreditCuriousity wrote:
@TRC_WA wrote:
@kal9988 wrote:
The goal is to get my score high enough that I can get another 0% card to transfer the balances to. The two offers end a month apart.
That doesn't sound good at all...

A mess I'm glad I'm not in.
10k isn't huge (well that term is relative to income, etc) , but deffinetly not going to be fun paying off if you can't get another 0% offer.
We don't know the OP's situation as of yet, so let's reserve judgement.

Wasn't judging, just trying to put a positive spin on it... I agree though how it can be taken that way.

Re: Debt/Credit Ratio

TRC_WA — Fri, 02 Jan 2015 02:54:29 GMT

@Anonymous wrote:
@TRC_WA wrote:
@kal9988 wrote:
The goal is to get my score high enough that I can get another 0% card to transfer the balances to. The two offers end a month apart.
That doesn't sound good at all...

A mess I'm glad I'm not in.
Thanks TRC_WA, this is the kind of useful information members come here looking for.

My bad... next time I'll encourage a person to apply for more credit cards to pay off other credit cards... because after all, robbing Peter to pay Paul is the best way to financial success.

Re: Debt/Credit Ratio

kal9988 — Fri, 02 Jan 2015 02:56:32 GMT

Where can I find the pre qualified sites?

Re: Debt/Credit Ratio

NRB525 — Fri, 02 Jan 2015 02:57:21 GMT

@Anonymous wrote:
@TRC_WA wrote:
@kal9988 wrote:
The goal is to get my score high enough that I can get another 0% card to transfer the balances to. The two offers end a month apart.
That doesn't sound good at all...

A mess I'm glad I'm not in.
Thanks TRC_WA, this is the kind of useful information members come here looking for.

I didn't see... are the existing two card APR, after the offer expires, stated anywhere here? And how long do these 0% offers have to run yet?