topic Re: I am crazy getting credit cards and I need your help with raising my score in General Credit Topics

I am crazy getting credit cards and I need your help with raising my score

Anonymous — Thu, 23 Apr 2009 15:57:59 GMT

Hello,

I am sure that you will see me as a crazy person who is having the "credit card" syndrome but what actually happened with me is that 6 months ago, I applied to all the credit cards in the US several times and I was tto be denied by that time, so I accumulated a too horrible number of inquiries that you cannot imagine, then suddenly I started to get accepted for larger amounts of credit. I have 3 Citi cards (total line: 7000), 1 Bank of America (2600), 1 Chase (600), 1 HSBC (500), 1 Kohls (300) and closed 1 Express (150). The total balance I have on all card is about 2800. The oldest account I have is HSBC and it had 6 months of age this month. I just got my score this month from FICO and it was 622. I never be late in payment or go over the limit. I am paying all as agreed and will continue to do for my life. By the way wehn I got the score, my balance was 3800. I am not sure how it looks like after paying this money. I get denial for any credit card you can imagine now and always the two constant reasons is the number of accounts I have and the number of inquiries and the balance. I know you need to know my goals. Actually, I am still craving for American Express cashback and Discover rewards. I am still applying but on a limited scale compared to the old days. I amm not happy with my score at all and I need to raise it quickly. I need some strategies and advices and I will be so glad to answer any question for you to advise me.

Thank you very much for all your help.

Re: I am crazy getting credit cards and I need your help with raising my score

Anonymous — Thu, 23 Apr 2009 16:29:06 GMT

No 1; STOP applying for credit right now. If your goal is to raise the amount you can carry as a balance you are headed for trouble, not a better FICO score.

2: How much do you really want that Discover or American Express? If the answer is as soon as possible you need to follow tip No 1. You have enough credit right now that if you wait for your inquiries to completely fall off, and you have no late payments or collections you will have a very good shot at getting those two cards IF they are the first 2 cards you apply for after those inquiries fall off. You can wait until those inquiries are one year old and no longer affect your score but the accounts you opened with them will still be a slight mark against you until they are at least 2 years old each.

At 622 carrying that balance you have a good shot at 700+ if you can pay that balance down to $0 and let those cards age a bit

You already have Citbank and BOFA so you are ahead of the curve for having your oldest account only 6 months

Message Edited by reots on 04-23-2009 09:29 AM

Re: I am crazy getting credit cards and I need your help with raising my score

Anonymous — Thu, 23 Apr 2009 16:42:57 GMT

Oshoair,

I am a credit newbie as well and I was just recently approved a Discover card after being denied twice. Your credit history is too short and all of the inquiries are going to kill your scores in the long run. Trust me, I know being approved for credit gives you that sense of accomplishment, but like a drug, it is only temporary. I was interested to know why your balances were so high and you have only had credit for a short period of time. The interest alone must be killing you...

Re: I am crazy getting credit cards and I need your help with raising my score

Anonymous — Fri, 24 Apr 2009 01:06:42 GMT

Hello reots,

Thank you very much for the advice. I really appreciate it. I totally understand that inquiries are really bad and that they much affect the score. My plans in the upcoming months is to pay all the balance I have and I have a very good plan for that and do nto apply again till I get a good score to apply for the American Express.

Thanks again and I always love to hear from you again.

oshoair

Re: I am crazy getting credit cards and I need your help with raising my score

Anonymous — Fri, 24 Apr 2009 01:12:15 GMT

Hello CMS2012,

Thank you very much for your nice advice. Actually, I had to buy a car so I used many of the balances. Also, I use the credit in everything including paying bills and getting groeries and everything. The good news is that I have zero percent APR on most of the cards till a good time that made me wait to pay the balance and I actually do not plan to have any APR because I have a plan to pay all the balances. I hope I am doing a good job with that.

Thanks again.

oshoair

Re: I am crazy getting credit cards and I need your help with raising my score

haulingthescoreup — Fri, 24 Apr 2009 21:19:00 GMT

Hi, oshoair, welcome to the forums!

Looks like you got some good advice here. Stop apping, and pay off your balances before the statements post, only letting one card report a $10-$20 balance, and then paying it off before the due date, so that you don't pay interest.

I would add, though, that you need to do some soul-searching as to what really motivated this wild app spree. There's the thrill of the hunt, there's the gambling addiction, there's the need to get validation from total strangers by having an application approved. Any one of these transfers power from yourself to the credit card companies, and this sets you up to be under their control. I think that during this waiting period, while the inquiries fall off, should be spent in discovering where this self-destructive behavior came from.

Nothing wrong with having lots of credit, but you must be its master, not the reverse. And you certainly won't be the first person here to have dealt with this! Good luck to you.

Re: I am crazy getting credit cards and I need your help with raising my score

Anonymous — Sat, 25 Apr 2009 01:52:16 GMT

You're so welcome!

I completely understand! Just keep doing what you are doing and I am sure you will just fine!

Keep us posted!

Re: I am crazy getting credit cards and I need your help with raising my score

Anonymous — Sat, 25 Apr 2009 03:01:59 GMT

I know exactly how you feel. I go through periods where I want to apply apply apply. It's really difficult to stop. Hopefully this forum will help us both. I have learned at least not to use the cards. It really feels good to be creditworthy.

Re: I am crazy getting credit cards and I need your help with raising my score

Anonymous — Sat, 25 Apr 2009 04:40:28 GMT

Hello haulingthescoreup,

Thank you very much for your reply. Although your reply was very biting and severly criticizing my personality in getting credit but I appreciate that you are that careful to give me advice to stop. Actually, I already stopped and by the way, I never paid late and will never do on any of my accounts. Also, during the previous couple of day, i decreased my total balance to about 2800/11000 which is good and I have still some months to pay this balance without any interest and I will. I have two questions, the first about since I made payments a couple of days ago, do you think if I pulled out another FICO score, it will have some difference even if little. Also, I would like to know if closing credit cards affects the FICO score badly if they are paid as agreed in full and I closed them with zero balance?

Thanks

Re: I am crazy getting credit cards and I need your help with raising my score

haulingthescoreup — Sat, 25 Apr 2009 14:06:35 GMT

oshoair wrote:

Hello haulingthescoreup,

Thank you very much for your reply. Although your reply was very biting and severly criticizing my personality in getting credit but I appreciate that you are that careful to give me advice to stop. Actually, I already stopped and by the way, I never paid late and will never do on any of my accounts. Also, during the previous couple of day, i decreased my total balance to about 2800/11000 which is good and I have still some months to pay this balance without any interest and I will. I have two questions, the first about since I made payments a couple of days ago, do you think if I pulled out another FICO score, it will have some difference even if little. Also, I would like to know if closing credit cards affects the FICO score badly if they are paid as agreed in full and I closed them with zero balance?

Thanks

Ouch, sorry, I didn't mean it to be that bad! We sometimes hand out tough love around here, because it's so upsetting to watch someone improve their situation temporarily, and then find themselves back in trouble a year later, because they didn't deal with what caused the problem in the first place. Anyway, glad you're on top of it.

The payments have to be reported by the CCC's (credit card companies) to the CRA's (credit reporting agencies; credit bureaus.) Then the CRA's have to update your reports. Usually Experian does this immediately, but Equifax and TransUnion often take up to a week. Your scores are created by the info on your reports at the moment you pull them, so until these new payments are showing on the reports, your FICO scores won't reflect them.

Closing cards only affects FICO scores if they had credit limits that significantly contribute to your total CL, plus if you have balances report, which you currently do. In calculating utilization of revolving credit, you divide the total amount owed by the total of credit limits. Closing cards does reduce the total of credit limits, so the denominator gets smaller, and so util rises. If it doesn't rise very much, or over a certain fraction, your scores might not change.

If you haven't already, read fused's Closing Credit Cards.