topic Re: Garden Club - December 2015 in Credit Cards

Garden Club - December 2015

SunriseEarth — Tue, 01 Dec 2015 14:37:17 GMT

Seasons Greetings

Garden Club Members!

What is gardening? Quite simply, it involves refraining from applying for new credit or seeking CLIs that require hard pulls. Soft pulls CLIs, however, are not only acceptable, but are encouraged. The idea is to allow one's current trade lines to grow and mature, waiting for inquiries to age or fall off, and possibly waiting for "baddies" to be removed/age off. During this time, one tends to one's current accounts and watches their AAoA grow and the new credit ding fade. Here we socialize, commiserate and support each other while waiting for baddies to fall off, new accounts and/or inq's age or just want a place to hang out to get away from the hustle and bustle of credit card talk.

So, if you're at the stage of your credit journey where you're ready to enter the garden, please come and join us. You may pick up your complimentary watering can and garden gloves by the front door -- you can even choose your favorite color! We're proud to offer a well appointed clubhouse. There is a snack table set up. You'll always find camaraderie available here as you work towards your gardening goals.

Help yourself to our drinks and appetizers. Flat-breads, sliders, pizza, buffalo wings, grilled zucchini, kale salads, pecan and apple pie Ala mode. There's also a nice selection of cold beers. Once again, please feel free to bring anything you'd like to add to the festivities. And, in the corner diagonally across from the front door, there is a fully stocked bar, along with a wide selection of soft drinks. If needed, there are some anti-itch medications stocked in our supply cabinet near the door -- Lanacaine, Benadryl, etc. If you need to place your reports in the deep freeze, we also have a freezer, located next to the bar, so go ahead and throw your reports in!

So come on in and make yourself comfortable. Make a gardening plan and commit to sticking with it! Are you planning to wait six months before applying for additional credit? A year? Until the last of your baddies drop off? Whatever your goal, we're here to support you. If you feel the "app-itch" coming on, let us know and we'll try to help you through it.

Now, if you happen to leave the garden prematurely, that's your decision and we respect that. You are always welcome to come back, pick up your gardening tools and start over again. But please, celebrate any approvals and the discussion of which credit card to app for on another thread. While we are happy with members’ success stories, we really do want to keep this threads focus and tone to be consistent with gardening efforts. You are certainly welcome to celebrate SP CLIs in this thread, as they do not involve inq's or apps for new credit.

GARDEN CLUB CHALLENGE AND RECOGNITIONS:
Garden Club Challenge: Pick a firm date for staying in the garden and post it in your siggy!
Garden Club recognition levels: To qualify, your reports must contain:
No new tradelines of any type on one's accounts (this includes any backdated account, as they are STILL new "seedlings").
No HPs for anything that would allow for the possibility of a new tradeline being issued or increasing the CL of an existing tradeline.

*The Garden Club community recognizes that certain inquiries are necessary for factors beyond those listed above. Therefore, Hard Pulls/Inquiries for the following bona fide reasons are exempt but not limited to: Opening checking/savings accounts (so long as no line of credit is being opened in addition to these accounts), Employment Applications, Apartment Rentals, Utilities and other such services. These are not considered to be applications for credit per se. Also, for those who are seeking a new mortgage or refinancing an existing one, we understand that your lender will pull your CRs multiple times before closing. For those GC'ers, the first hp will set your clock, not the subsequent pulls. However, if you are simply rate shopping, then the normal hp rules apply.

You will be able to add the following to your siggy if you have been abiding by the above for the following time periods...

Less than 1 month - seedling
1 month - bronze spade
3 months - silver spade
6 months - gold spade
9 months - palladium spade
12 months - platinum spade
15 months - ruby spade
18 months - emerald spade
21 months - sapphire spade
24 months or more - diamond spade

Please note: recognition levels reset once you add an account or incur a HP. We recognize that there may be very good reasons for "leaving the garden," and we respect whatever thoughtful decisions members make. As stated previously, members are always welcome to come back, grab their gloves and start gardening once more.

To ensure that your graphic comes out properly on your siggy, please be certain that it has been added as the very first line of code.

Seedling:

<img src="http://ficoforums.myfico.com/t5/image/serverpage/image-id/2760iB9166C1A493A3CBC" title="Seedling Garden Club Member" border="0" width="50" height="67" align="right">

Bronze:

<img src="http://i.imgur.com/LEYWe.png" border="0" title="Bronze Garden Club Member" width="40" height="40" align="right">

SIlver:

<img src="http://i.imgur.com/Gfc4B.png" border="0" title="Silver Garden Club Member" width="40" height="40" align="right">

Gold:

<img src="http://i.imgur.com/24xvV.png" border="0" title="Gold Garden Club Member" width="40" height="40" align="right">

Palladium:

<img src="http://ficoforums.myfico.com/t5/image/serverpage/image-id/5761iE36E284CEECEA414" title="Palladium Garden Club Member" border="0" width="40" height="40" align="right">

Platinum:

<img src="http://i.imgur.com/vVRv5.png" border="0" alt="" title="Platinum Garden Club Member" width="120" height="80" align="right" />

Ruby:

<img src="http://ficoforums.myfico.com/t5/image/serverpage/image-id/5625i09098E9833D7A4B2" border="0" title="Ruby Garden Club Member" width="40" height="40" align="right">

Emerald:

<img src="http://ficoforums.myfico.com/t5/image/serverpage/image-id/5623i698C4BF1F9D77284" border="0" width="40" title="Emerald Garden Club Member" height="40" align="right">

Sapphire:

<img src="http://ficoforums.myfico.com/t5/image/serverpage/image-id/5627iA714E0C3C98AD3FD" border="0" width="40" title="Sapphire Garden Club Member" height="40" align="right">

Diamond:

<img src="http://i.imgur.com/40nIa.png" border="0" alt="" title="Diamond Garden Club Member" width="40" height="40" align="right" />

So, please feel free to come on in and share your gardening progress. If you're new or returning, what are your goals? If you've been here for a while, how are things going? Let's all mingle, and support each other in our respective gardening efforts!

Just a reminder, if you are new to the forum chances are you will not be able to add your seedling to your profile. Send any mod a PM and we'll add it for you You can also report any post inappropriate in the GC and just state that you need __________ spade. (Be that seedling, bronze, etc.)

Re: Garden Club - December 2015

Anonymous — Tue, 01 Dec 2015 10:22:37 GMT

#1 woohoo!

Re: Garden Club - December 2015

Anonymous — Tue, 01 Dec 2015 10:25:01 GMT

Hello fellow GC members. omw to a silver spade next month and dont see anything getting in the way of that accomplishment. Content with my portfolio and slowly paying down a Citi balance on my DP. Good luck to all with your goals, garden strong!

Re: Garden Club - December 2015

SunriseEarth — Tue, 01 Dec 2015 10:34:46 GMT

Looks like some of you were anxiously awaiting the new Garden thread. Sorry we weren't able to get to it until now!

I've already had December success! Today was Day 91 for Discover....so I hit the button and got a $500 CLI. Every little bit counts, right? So I guess I'll try again in 91 days. As for the rest of my plan for December, here goes:

1. SP CLI. I'll try Gold Violin some time after the 10th. I've had success with Discover and Sam's Club, but I don't have any others that are due. IIRC, I'll try in February at Cap One; however, since two of those cards are SDed, I might not have luck. Oh well.

2. Lowering UTIL Still in the process of making my CU Visa and Discover a bit lower. I think Discover is a bit stingy on CLIs, since I have a balance sitting on the card, and that's understandable.

3. Zero balances. I never seem to have enough of those. Since we're in the holiday season, I probably still won't have enough.

That's pretty much it here...nothing too much going on.

Re: Garden Club - December 2015

Pookubbq — Tue, 01 Dec 2015 10:51:42 GMT

16 Months Going Strong WOOHOOO

Re: Garden Club - December 2015

dt3813 — Tue, 01 Dec 2015 10:55:06 GMT

Impatiently waiting for my silver spade on the 5th. 2016 is my year. The rest of my IIB fall off and then 1/2017 my ch.13.... I.cant.wait. Until then I am a gardener.

Re: Garden Club - December 2015

Anonymous — Tue, 01 Dec 2015 10:56:41 GMT

Good morning and happy December, fellow gardeners. I made it to my first spade! Yay! It was a very good year for rebuilding. Love reading everyone's posts.

December is here!

Re: Garden Club - December 2015

Anonymous — Tue, 01 Dec 2015 10:59:13 GMT

@Anonymous wrote:
Hello fellow GC members. omw to a silver spade next month and dont see anything getting in the way of that accomplishment. Content with my portfolio and slowly paying down a Citi balance on my DP. Good luck to all with your goals, garden strong!

Checking in for December!

Me too! Silver spade here I come!!

Re: Garden Club - December 2015

the_jan_b — Tue, 01 Dec 2015 11:31:18 GMT

I'm still here! 25 days away from an emerald spade!!! Woo-hoo!

***Waves to everyone; and brought the famous 7Up cake!!***

Re: Garden Club - December 2015

baller4life — Tue, 01 Dec 2015 11:35:10 GMT

First page!! Haha. Good morning!!!

Re: Garden Club - December 2015

EdMan63 — Tue, 01 Dec 2015 11:45:15 GMT

Happy December everyone. Well at least I woke up this morning to a 10 pt jump on my Exp. My scores took a hit back in Sept from some outside the garden activity but as we say " gardening is good "! Hopfully the others went up as well but I can't run my 3 report for a couple of days. Either way time will cure all. Everyone have a great day!

Re: Garden Club - December 2015

Anonymous — Tue, 01 Dec 2015 12:18:59 GMT

I'm in - on page 2. Can't believe it's December! Tomorrow will be 4 months in the garden and the results are starting to show.

Good luck everyone!

Re: Garden Club - December 2015

Anonymous — Tue, 01 Dec 2015 12:29:41 GMT

New garden month = new Discover score posting! Waiting with baited breath to see if I got up to 800 and . . . 5 point decrease to 794. Oh well, there is always January.

Re: Garden Club - December 2015

Anonymous — Tue, 01 Dec 2015 12:33:18 GMT

On the plus side, DW's score jumped 30 points to 775! Since her's is lower, we have to use it for the mortgage that we're going to apply for next year, so I'm thrilled that it broke the 760 boundary!

Re: Garden Club - December 2015

Anonymous — Tue, 01 Dec 2015 12:35:17 GMT

Hello GC! Happy Tuesday. I am about to head to work and get some major stuff done today.

Re: Garden Club - December 2015

Anonymous — Tue, 01 Dec 2015 12:44:12 GMT

Happy Holidays everyone. Back to a seedling. On a good note, I really only have I more card goal to accomplish in the Spring. Then I'm going for Diamond.
Best Wishes to all.

Re: Garden Club - December 2015

OMW2_HighAcheiver — Tue, 01 Dec 2015 13:16:09 GMT

Happy December Gardening Y'all!
Happy Holidays

Re: Garden Club - December 2015

Anonymous — Tue, 01 Dec 2015 13:20:25 GMT

@Anonymous wrote:
I'm in - on page 2. Can't believe it's December! Tomorrow will be 4 months in the garden and the results are starting to show.

Good luck everyone!

I want your scores so I am gardening for at least six months!

Re: Garden Club - December 2015

CreditCuriosity — Tue, 01 Dec 2015 13:33:42 GMT

Good morning all... Appears I will be here for awhile being 6 months to a year. So mise well start making some more friends in this thread. Lazy telecommute day from home today and not to mention another rainy/cloudy day.

Re: Garden Club - December 2015

MissMoni223 — Tue, 01 Dec 2015 13:37:22 GMT

Hi Fellow GC Members!

I'm checking in for the month of December! I'm still yet holding on, LOL!!! I'm FOCUSED and it's a GREAT thing to see your credit score continue to INCREASE! Gardening WORKS, so does keeping your utilization under 10%, & making on-time payments!!! YOU can do it!!!