topic Re: Paid off cards, now what? in Credit Cards

Paid off cards, now what?

Anonymous — Thu, 12 Mar 2015 18:02:44 GMT

Hello everyone,

Some of you saw my journey to zero balances thread where I revealed my massive (34k) amount of CC debt to the world. I was able to secure a loan from Lending Club for the full amount and now all thats left are DW's balances (another 14k). I think its safe to start closing some of these cards down so I can focus just on a few cards. The ones I would like to keep are Discover IT, Capital One QS, Chase BP, and Osterman though the last two I'm definitely flexible on if you think they aren't worth keeping. I was thinking I wanted to keep them because they are two of my oldest TL's (both approx 15 years) and the Osterman card has a pretty high limit.

Ready for input!

Re: Paid off cards, now what?

Anonymous — Thu, 12 Mar 2015 18:03:50 GMT

Start with store cards. Try not to prune real cards TOO quickly.

Re: Paid off cards, now what?

noobody — Thu, 12 Mar 2015 18:10:42 GMT

do not forget combine limit with chase accounts

Re: Paid off cards, now what?

Anonymous — Thu, 12 Mar 2015 18:12:33 GMT

For my personal preference, I'd keep open any cards with long history or high limits. I'd start cutting down on the Store cards that you never use.

Re: Paid off cards, now what?

Shelly13 — Thu, 12 Mar 2015 18:19:48 GMT

I agree with the above posts. Store cards for sure. Unless you actually have a store you like where you can gain benefits from the card and can PIF.

I only have one store card because I enjoy shopping at VS and I make sure I don't go crazy in there because I know I want to PIF. They send me coupons and rewards so for me it's a benefit.

Re: Paid off cards, now what?

Anonymous — Thu, 12 Mar 2015 18:19:27 GMT

@noobody wrote:
do not forget combine limit with chase accounts

One of the Chase Slate cards is already closed, it was closed by Chase 3-4 years ago. Am I able to combine a $400 card into the $5k card that doesn't belong to me but to my wife?

Re: Paid off cards, now what?

Creditaddict — Thu, 12 Mar 2015 18:20:14 GMT

So am I seeing this right if you just remove yourself as AU on the 4 cards you will have ZERO credit card debt and 1 loan??

REMOVE YOURSELF!

Then get a new Balance Transfer card probably from capital one the way they are handing those things out and Balance transfer ALL of those store cards to it... those balances and those interest rates are killing both of you!

Re: Paid off cards, now what?

Anonymous — Thu, 12 Mar 2015 18:22:59 GMT

@Creditaddict wrote:
So am I seeing this right if you just remove yourself as AU on the 4 cards you will have ZERO credit card debt and 1 loan??

REMOVE YOURSELF!

Then get a new Balance Transfer card probably from capital one the way they are handing those things out and Balance transfer ALL of those store cards to it... those balances and those interest rates are killing both of you!

Zero credit card debt, 4 loans. Lending Club, my car and student loans, and my mortgage.

Re: Paid off cards, now what?

CreditCuriosity — Thu, 12 Mar 2015 18:26:22 GMT

@Creditaddict wrote:
So am I seeing this right if you just remove yourself as AU on the 4 cards you will have ZERO credit card debt and 1 loan??

REMOVE YOURSELF!

Then get a new Balance Transfer card probably from capital one the way they are handing those things out and Balance transfer ALL of those store cards to it... those balances and those interest rates are killing both of you!

^+1 your scores will sky rocket... Keep a few dollars or less then <10% on one major CC, remove yourself as an AU for now until you get her Utilization under control as well.

BTW awesome job!

Re: Paid off cards, now what?

SpideySense — Thu, 12 Mar 2015 20:54:22 GMT

++ drop your AU cards (you'll get a big score jump)

Chase Slate (this depends on your short term strategy):

drop your Slate for a possible future strategy for $0fee-0% balance transfer

keep your Slate for a near-term 2%fee-0% balance transfer, add the Chase BP Gas climit (and keep a chase product because you dopped the Chase Freedom AU),

Product Change to a Freedom (for better rewards) with both your slate and bpgas

BestBuy RewardZone (annual fee)

unless you're a fatwallet/slickdeals ninja and have been churning massive rewards, drop this -- you'll still have credit power with your other cards and will save the AF.

as far as the other cards, unless you have a personal preference (or somebody has definitive proof that fewer cards raises credit scores), i can't see an active need to close them.

Osterman at 7.6k is a sizeable chunk of your total available credit. -- keeping this available credit lets you carry an additional 700 while maintaining a near 10% utilization for max score.

Kroger rewards (depending on how/where you shop) is your best grocery/fuel card now and a possible USBANK Product Change later .

Amazon and Paypal have occasional specials that might be worth keeping them sock-drawered (although you could close them now, and re-apply for them later to get future promotional benefits).

Chase BP Gas - combine with Chase Slate (since you will have dropped the AU Chase Freedom)

And bigtime congrats on the comeback!

s¢

Re: Paid off cards, now what?

Anonymous — Thu, 12 Mar 2015 21:20:25 GMT

@SpideySense wrote:
++ drop your AU cards (you'll get a big score jump)

Chase Slate (this depends on your short term strategy):
drop your Slate for a possible future strategy for $0fee-0% balance transfer
or
keep your Slate for a near-term 2%fee-0% balance transfer, add the Chase BP Gas climit (and keep a chase product because you dopped the Chase Freedom AU),
or
Product Change to a Freedom (for better rewards) with both your slate and bpgas

BestBuy RewardZone (annual fee)
unless you're a fatwallet/slickdeals ninja and have been churning massive rewards, drop this -- you'll still have credit power with your other cards and will save the AF.

as far as the other cards, unless you have a personal preference (or somebody has definitive proof that fewer cards raises credit scores), i can't see an active need to close them.
Osterman at 7.6k is a sizeable chunk of your total available credit. -- keeping this available credit lets you carry an additional 700 while maintaining a near 10% utilization for max score.
Kroger rewards (depending on how/where you shop) is your best grocery/fuel card now and a possible USBANK Product Change later .
Amazon and Paypal have occasional specials that might be worth keeping them sock-drawered (although you could close them now, and re-apply for them later to get future promotional benefits).
Chase BP Gas - combine with Chase Slate (since you will have dropped the AU Chase Freedom)

And bigtime congrats on the comeback!

s¢

My thought behind closing a bunch was that I thought I read somewhere that having a bunch of small limits will keep your other CL's from going up. As for the RewardZone thats been at $0 for almost a month now, only reason I haven't closed it already is because the AF was in January so I have all year in case I want to use it for something.

As for PC from Slate to Freedom I tried but Chase said there were "no offers for me". Not sure if that will change when my UTI drops to 0 with all 3 or not.

Re: Paid off cards, now what?

BarryNTexas — Thu, 12 Mar 2015 22:45:35 GMT

Congrats FinallyPA! I look forward to following your progress. For everyone else can you explain how shifting your credit card debt off onto a personal line of credit will improve your scores? Isn't that just a shift of balances from revolving to installment?

Would love to learn more about the FICO effect using such a strategy... I get the interest charges saved aspect and consolidation of all debt to one payment.

Re: Paid off cards, now what?

Anonymous — Thu, 12 Mar 2015 23:07:28 GMT

I'm sorry, I'm just assuming my scores will rise. Every credit "negative factor" on my reports is always about the number of revolving accounts with balances and the proportion of balances to limits on my revolvers. That's what leads me to believe my revolving util going to 1 to 9 percent will make my scores jump. It definitely wouldn't surprise me to be wrong about that.

Re: Paid off cards, now what?

Creditaddict — Thu, 12 Mar 2015 23:11:02 GMT

@Anonymous wrote:
I'm sorry, I'm just assuming my scores will rise. Every credit "negative factor" on my reports is always about the number of revolving accounts with balances and the proportion of balances to limits on my revolvers. That's what leads me to believe my revolving util going to 1 to 9 percent will make my scores jump. It definitely wouldn't surprise me to be wrong about that.

you will see a jump by why not temporarily remove yourself as AU on those maxed out accounts... or move those balances to your BofA line of credit and then wait for the big jump in score and get a good balance transfer card... leaving those store cards is crazy business.

Re: Paid off cards, now what?

Anonymous — Thu, 12 Mar 2015 23:15:30 GMT

I can't move anything to BoA. That gold option line of credit is a sham. They sold it as a fixed rate loc but shortly after you get they switch it to a variable rate for new balance transfers. They don't even deal with the product any more. It reports as open on my CRs but they won't let me use it.

I'm all in for closing almost all of the store cards and I already removed myself from three of the four AU's but my wife has to go to a branch to remove me from key. That's insane.

Re: Paid off cards, now what?

Creditaddict — Thu, 12 Mar 2015 23:16:59 GMT

you can just dispute the au accounts and they come off next day!