topic Re: Mid 500s, on my way up - looking for my next card to target in Credit Cards

Mid 500s, on my way up - looking for my next card to target

Anonymous — Mon, 22 Oct 2018 01:48:44 GMT

Hey everyone -

I've been rebuilding my credit lately and I've been trying to take a look at some of the cards, their rewards and generally their overall value for my FICO, etc.

I was wondering if anyone has any good suggestions for CB cards, any benefits or rewards cards that you'd think I should keep an eye on - or if there are any cards I should "set my goals" towards, I'd love to hear the suggestions.

I currently have a Discover IT secured, a Cap1 Quicksilver, a Wells secured (just graduated, active next month)and an OpenSky secured. I don't have a ton of history, beyond a year for cards at this point, but I want to make sure I'm manicuring my situation with goals in mind.

Thanks!

Re: Mid 500s, on my way up - looking for my next card to target

Medic981 — Mon, 22 Oct 2018 02:02:42 GMT

Welcome to the myFICO forums!

Ultimately, what someone needs to improve their FICO scores and build credit are three open credit cards (secured or unsecured) in good standing and one open installment loan in good standing such as a car, home, student, personal, share secured, or credit building loan. This combination is what the myFICO score theorists here have determined is what you need for optimal credit building and FICO score. You can have more CCs and more installment loans, however, this will not increase your FICO scores.

Next, (this is only important if you are attempting to purchase a large ticket item like a home or car) is paying in full all of the credit card balances each month, before the posting date, except one. This is called the All Zero Except One (AZEO) method. The one credit card you allow to post a balance needs to be less than 8.9% of the credit limit of the card. So using one card each month to buy lunch, letting it report and then paying in full will maximize FICO scoring. Keeping your utilization of your cards below 28.9% both individually and collectively will prevent you from incurring a FICO scoring penalty.

An installment loan will have its greatest impact on your FICO score when the amount owed is at 8.9% or less of the original amount owed which is usually in the final months before the loan is paid in full. If you don't have an installment loan you can check into SelfLender or a Share Secured Loan at a Credit Union.

Keep in mind, building credit is a marathon, not a sprint. It involves demonstrating to a potential creditor that you can handle credit responsibly. If you have open, active credit accounts that are being paid on time and pay all of your bills on time every time, apply for credit only when you actually need it and use credit cards sparingly maintaining low credit utilization, then you’re going to earn and maintain great credit scores. It would be impossible for you not to do so. This is the fastest way you can build good, solid credit.

Re: Mid 500s, on my way up - looking for my next card to target

PointsBonus — Mon, 22 Oct 2018 02:12:50 GMT

Try CreditOne Credit Card to start.

Re: Mid 500s, on my way up - looking for my next card to target

Anonymous — Mon, 22 Oct 2018 02:16:41 GMT

@PointsBonus wrote:
Try CreditOne Credit Card to start.

I'm curious if you read their post. No need to add a vulture card with what they already have.

Re: Mid 500s, on my way up - looking for my next card to target

PointsBonus — Mon, 22 Oct 2018 02:17:34 GMT

Not a vulture card if u pay it off every month before the closing date. Credit One helped me improve my score tremendously the first year.
Key is to pay it off beside like a $10.00 balance every month.
Need a coupl or three NON secure cards.

Re: Mid 500s, on my way up - looking for my next card to target

Anonymous — Mon, 22 Oct 2018 02:19:58 GMT

Yeah, exactly this.

I'm looking for a good card/card company to start setting my sights on.

I've got all the credit repair style cards I could need, so it's not just an any card I can grab situation.

If there's a great card that requires x years of history, x amount of HP, open accounts, etc - I want to start setting up my foundation.

Re: Mid 500s, on my way up - looking for my next card to target

Anonymous — Mon, 22 Oct 2018 02:20:50 GMT

@PointsBonus wrote:
Need a coupl or three NON secure cards.

the QS is unsecured, the WF just graduated, and the Discover will graduate.

Re: Mid 500s, on my way up - looking for my next card to target

seattlecredit08 — Mon, 22 Oct 2018 03:27:46 GMT

If you are looking to add a quality secured card, I would highly recommend OpenSky.

Why:

No credit inquiry to get
Reports as unsecured
Reports as its parent company "Capital Bank." While it may not be that important, it certainly looks better on one's CR than CreditOne or PremierFirst, which may signal sub-prime during manual underwriting.

If you can, I would recommend starting with a maximum limit $3000 (or as high as possible) as this may come handy later on to get higher limits.

On the negative side, this card never graduates (of course, one can always close it and get the money back).

Thanks!!!

Re: Mid 500s, on my way up - looking for my next card to target

Anonymous — Mon, 22 Oct 2018 03:53:14 GMT

@seattlecredit08 wrote:
If you are looking to add a quality secured card, I would highly recommend OpenSky.

Why:
No credit inquiry to get
Reports as unsecured
Reports as its parent company "Capital Bank." While it may not be that important, it certainly looks better on one's CR than CreditOne or PremierFirst, which may signal sub-prime during manual underwriting.
If you can, I would recommend starting with a maximum limit $3000 (or as high as possible) as this may come handy later on to get higher limits.

On the negative side, this card never graduates (of course, one can always close it and get the money back).

Thanks!!!

They already have that card. They are not looking for anything they can get. You didn't read the post like the other guy...lol

Re: Mid 500s, on my way up - looking for my next card to target

Anonymous — Mon, 22 Oct 2018 03:55:50 GMT

I'd love some good recos that aren't cards I already listed as owning. 🧐

Re: Mid 500s, on my way up - looking for my next card to target

Brian_Earl_Spilner — Mon, 22 Oct 2018 03:58:46 GMT

@PointsBonus wrote:
Not a vulture card if u pay it off every month before the closing date. Credit One helped me improve my score tremendously the first year.
Key is to pay it off beside like a $10.00 balance every month.
Need a coupl or three NON secure cards.

Whether a card is secured or not doesn't matter. He's not applying for a Simmons or 20k personal loan in the immediate future.

Re: Mid 500s, on my way up - looking for my next card to target

Brian_Earl_Spilner — Mon, 22 Oct 2018 04:02:19 GMT

You should start by stating what your goals are. Add in expected spend and on what. If you're a big traveler, that would significantly change what's recommended to you versus if you stay at home and don't buy anything.

Re: Mid 500s, on my way up - looking for my next card to target

Anonymous — Mon, 22 Oct 2018 04:13:42 GMT

I had mentioned looking for CB cards, because generally most of my spending is more general. That being said, if there's an amazing travel card that it would make sense for me to use because the rewards would amount to travel, sure. But I don't need to travel for work, therefore I won't be able to buy 4 plane tickets a month to really build the rewards.

Hotels, kindof the same deal.

If there's a card thats similar to say the Discover/Amazon deal that I had seen - I would intentionally shift a % of my spending to Amazon, to effectively "game" that reward.

My goals for CL are simply "more" because I could handle it, I do make larger purchases that I would be able to pay down immediately.

Example: my CL on my Cap1 is 500 with a 1.5% cb and because it's my only card with a reward, I use it as often as I can. I've had it for a very short time, not even 1 full billing cycle and I've already got a little over $30 in cash back... But paying the card down on repeat just to keep using it is obviously obnoxious.

A $500 fee isn't a deal breaker for me if I'm getting a good program behind it, etc.

I think this might be more helpful? I'm VERY new to credit cards - I botched my credit and chexsystems within months of turning 18 and didn't pay attention to anything credit related for another 12+ years - and had another couple years of sorting things out before I just dove into cc land this year.

Re: Mid 500s, on my way up - looking for my next card to target

zerofire — Mon, 22 Oct 2018 15:30:02 GMT

Let me get this straight. Your current scores are in the 500's yet all of the negative info is over 10 years old? Sounds like instead of thinking of a card you need to clean up your reports instead. Pull reports of all three and get rid of any negative info via dispute since sometimes it likes to stay around past the max. Also you state you have 3 cards yet there are 6 recent HP's. What are the other accounts that you tried to get?

Since you are in the Mid 500's you really need to wait until you hit around 700 for your next card or even better 750. This will guarantee you the card and that you will get generous terms. Once all of the uncertainty of your profile clears up your score will shoot up like the bean stalk. With the increased score you will get higher limits on your existing cards. Discover will be good for this as a CLI with them is a SP. Capitol One also likes money going through the card. Eventually they will probably give you and Auto CLI or if you wait 6-12 months after it graduated you can just ask them. Then they could have also have put you into credit steps which slowly increases your avalable limit as long as you pay on time. In that program an Auto CLI is scheduled at 4 months.

Right now your biggest issues are any negative info left over from your mess and the low limits on your existing cards. Work to get solid relationships so that they will trust you with a higher limit. The low limits are what they wish to risk on you(your risky) and are messing with utilization. Skip AZEO since it artificially improves your scores and let it report balances but PIF. Lenders will see that you need a CLI.

Re: Mid 500s, on my way up - looking for my next card to target

Anonymous — Tue, 23 Oct 2018 01:21:59 GMT

I think I was short in my description, but didn't intend to leave details out -

I had old accounts, I cleaned all that up 2 years ago.

I didn't give a full back history on my accounts as I was just kinda looking for a few card suggestions, tips on building up to cards, etc.

Re: Mid 500s, on my way up - looking for my next card to target

zerofire — Thu, 25 Oct 2018 19:32:57 GMT

@Anonymous wrote:
I think I was short in my description, but didn't intend to leave details out -

I had old accounts, I cleaned all that up 2 years ago.

I didn't give a full back history on my accounts as I was just kinda looking for a few card suggestions, tips on building up to cards, etc.

So what is your current score? If your in the 500's then you still have a problem. Cleanup or not. You want CLI's not new cards if it is where you say it is.

Re: Mid 500s, on my way up - looking for my next card to target

Anonymous — Thu, 25 Oct 2018 19:47:02 GMT

Was just looking for card suggesting, not suggestions on how to improve my current credit profile - I've already got a plan there, it's already in motion, I just didn't feel the need to explain my entire score profile when asking for future reward card suggestions. They are not tied to each other, so it's what it is.

Re: Mid 500s, on my way up - looking for my next card to target

FireMedic1 — Thu, 25 Oct 2018 21:58:27 GMT

@Anonymous wrote:
Was just looking for card suggesting, not suggestions on how to improve my current credit profile - I've already got a plan there, it's already in motion, I just didn't feel the need to explain my entire score profile when asking for future reward card suggestions. They are not tied to each other, so it's what it is.

They are tied together. What your hoping for and others are trying to explain to you are your scores are not inline with what you want to obtain at this time. Only thing right now to "improve my current credit profile" is time. Its not a race. Spend time fixing whats holding your score down first. Then worry about what cards you can get when the scores go up. Yes try to get CLI's on what you have. The higher your CL's the higher the SL's will be on future cards. They are tied together also. Right now in all honesty there will be a few or more wasted HP's and declines. It took me about 2 and a half yrs and I started with 1 Cap1 card at $2000.

We are here to help anyone and everyone get their profiles stronger for their goal cards and get their scores up to get those cards. If you dont want to list whats holding you down. Your choice. Then we dont have much to go by to help. Good Luck!

Re: Mid 500s, on my way up - looking for my next card to target

Anonymous — Thu, 25 Oct 2018 23:54:12 GMT

My score is 607 across the board as of this moment, I've paid off every collections account, I've opened a Discover Secured card recently to increase my % - my usage was always high because my CL was low, as well as was approved for a Cap1 Quicksilver - they haven't reported yet, they are very new.

I'm getting a self lender, I'm also opening an account with NFCU because they seem to be a pretty amazing CU to deal with and my only previous issues with CU was location - NFCU is in a lot of locations, so its a perfect thing for me in that sense.

Most of the reasons for my score being held down is/was mostly lack of age and lack of total accounts. I've been working on the things I can, paid off all my collections last year, student loans as well. Checked my report, wiped that all out. I'm patient as well - but also realized that I could have probably avoided all of these issues a decade ago if I understood credit back then. Haha.

So my question was, are there any rewards cards I will want to start a relationship with or should know the qualifications for and use those as goals.

My score is going to be in the 700s as soon as all of my cards kick in, plus - age. I know some cards look for X accounts open, X CL available, X useage, X number of pulls in the last year, etc.

I wasn't trying to disregard any advice and I appreciate all of it . I just didn't need advice on bringing my score up, just wanted to set some prepared goals using rewards card suggestions.

Re: Mid 500s, on my way up - looking for my next card to target

Anonymous — Fri, 26 Oct 2018 20:43:55 GMT

NFCU has great cards with high starting limits for those in your current situation. Get one of those and then garden.