topic Rebuilding in Rebuilding Your Credit

Rebuilding

MakeItShine — Mon, 15 Dec 2025 00:35:27 GMT

Hello! I'm new here and just looking for some tips. I'll give some info, feel free to ask for more. I'm on a serious rebuild post divorce and truly just now (in my 40s) understanding credit. In April 2025 my scores were as low as 540. Today my FICOs are around 650. I have some credit cards, but not main stream ones (credit one (2 of them CL $700/$750), **bleep**’S Mastercard (CL $1500), indigo (CL $2000), mission lane (CL $500), Fortiva (CL $400), PayPal MC (CL $380). No collections, no car loan, I make about $120k annually. I'm massively rebuilding and learning. My newer cards are the two higher limit ones. I'm right on the cusp of entering "good credit" zone. I desperately want a real credit card to boost my profile, not another subprime, low limit. I should mention I was blacklisted from capital one in the spring which is what launched me into learned what credit really is. They closed all my accounts for "credit cycling" I had no idea I was even doing that, but paying them off frequently and using them to max utilization. Now my goal is to get all of them under 30%, then under 20%. I'm almost there. But capital one is off the table. Most of the prequals haven't been successful. Are there cards I could consider that start with a real limit? Can't be below $2k or I'm just chasing low utilization. Thank you!

Re: Rebuilding

FicoMike0 — Mon, 15 Dec 2025 05:14:21 GMT

Welcome to the forum.

You report no collections, how about charge offs and lates? Your scores seem a little low to have no baddies.

your subprime cards aren't hurting your scores, there are no bonus points for fancy cards.

With low limits, utilization may be hurting you. Util is worth 30% of your score. You want to keep reported individual utilization under 29% and aggragate under 9%. Pay attention to reported. most banks report on the day the account posts, that's t he balance that counts for scores. If your statement says $750 on a $1000 limit, that's 75%, big penalty. If you pay it in full the next day, your still at 75% till next month. To manage that, you need to make a payment before it posts. Sounds like you did that a lot with Capone and they didn't like it. I don't know how much is too much. I'm not crazy about Capone anyway, you can live without them.

Another trick is called aze1. All zero except one. Pay all accounts to zero before they post except one, which posts a modest balance, maybe 9%. This avoids two penalties, "too many accounts reporting a balance" and "no account reporting a balance". Yes, they penalize both of those.

Since you have no car loan, you might do a ssl, share secured loan. This works if you have no open installment loan. Look up "ssl" there are a lot of threads. You can get about 30 points. It's a little complicated, read about it, then come back with questions, we'll help. It's sort of a trick, but it's legit and works.

There are penalties for hard inquiries, minimize those. There's also a penalty for an account under 12 months, if you can hold out that long you'll see a score increase. At least that's what the experts say, I wouldn't know, I don't seem to be able to wait that long, lol.

As far as new cards, you have more than enough to build credit already. Three is enough. Wait for better scores, then go for cards you really want. For me, amex offers the best limits and rapid increases. Once above 700, id recommend bce, no fee, nice sub, 3% cats. Just do apply with confidence once a month, no penalty if they decline. Even a $1000 limit will grow, amex will do 3X request after 91 days. I went from $6,000 to $27,000 in a year.

Re: Rebuilding

Patient957 — Mon, 15 Dec 2025 14:58:29 GMT

Here are my recommendations:

1) You don't need any more credit cards right now. In fact, you should consider closing one or two of the most predatory ones with the highest AF. I agree with @FicoMike0 that you can check Amex's "apply with confidence" occasionally to see if you can pick up a non-predatory no-AF card. Your goal shouldn't be more cards or high limits at this time. It should be to replace predatory with non-predatory. High limits will come with time.

2) Learn to manage your utilization. Get it under 10% and keep it there. This will help with everything you're trying to do. You've got a pretty nice income and low limits, so hopefully this will be easy to do.

3) If you don't have any open installment loan, like a student or personal loan, then consider a Penfed or Navy SSL. You could gain 20-30 points, but it only really works if it's your only open installment loan. Plenty of discussion and best practices by searching these forums.

4) Spending some time gardening would likely help you a lot. What are the ages and annual fees of each of the credit cards you have now?

Re: Rebuilding

MakeItShine — Tue, 16 Dec 2025 00:03:33 GMT

Hi! Thank you so much for such a thoughtful response. I have been diligent about knowing who reports when and do my absolute best to pay as much as possible beforehand. I'm using credit only in emergencies (not anything wild fortunately, but meaning big "right now" expenses that I might charge and pay off completely or at 75% the next weeks check--I have two kids so sports registrations and stuff like that). As for the baddies, embarrassing but I'm here for it all. I have 5 lates total. The last one was April. That's when I kicked it into high gear. I'm rebounding after divorce. I saw my score jump when it was 6 months since my last late. So hoping those others are nearing falling off. No charge offs any time recently. About 8 years ago I had a couple. Do those still count if they aged out? My reports show zero delinquencies, etc. this is sadly and proudly the highest my score has ever been. Nobody ever taught me and I was so embarrassingly uninformed. So going from about 544 in April to 655 currently is a big deal for me but I'm definitely kind of just at a place of stagnation. On FICO it says my utilization is at 43% on vantage my utilizations are 25% and 28%. Either way I am really getting them all down and no longer have anything over 60% as of this month. Some are already under 30%. I'm also hoping to buy a house again this year when I get the equity/buyout from the divorce next month. Ugh this is hard but also it's worth the hard work. I never want to go backwards again!

Re: Rebuilding

MakeItShine — Tue, 16 Dec 2025 00:09:03 GMT

Hi! Thank you for your input! I don't want to close any yet bc I need the age. I think my credit age is around 3-4 years. I plan to pay down mission lane, both credit ones, PPMC, and Fortiva to below 10%. Keep them active but not really use them so I have Netflix on one, etc. and then use (in this order) dicks Mastercard and indigo for the emergency or need a week between paycheck things (luckily not often) bc they have the better utilization obviously. I'm fiercely learning to budget, I can make a **bleep** good dinner out of my freezer and pantry, I am thinking 3 times before I buy something that could wait and walking away knowing I put something else toward a CC rather than making the little bit of money disappear on something I don't need. I'm also saving. This is the most I've ever had (aside from the equity I'm getting), which might sound small but I have saved $3500 since April and have never had anything in savings. So it's all working but I just feeling like I want to turn that last corner into the "good zone". Again, thank you for your feedback! I'll take all I can get!

Re: Rebuilding

MakeItShine — Tue, 16 Dec 2025 00:12:56 GMT

I should add! I have student loans. I'm finally applying for public service forgiveness. Let's see how that goes. I think credit one both have an AF but it's low. I won't take any cards with AFs. Nope. Not worth it anymore!

Re: Rebuilding

Patient957 — Tue, 16 Dec 2025 00:33:35 GMT

@MakeItShine wrote:
Hi! Thank you for your input! I don't want to close any yet bc I need the age. I think my credit age is around 3-4 years. I plan to pay down mission lane, both credit ones, PPMC, and Fortiva to below 10%. Keep them active but not really use them so I have Netflix on one, etc. and then use (in this order) dicks Mastercard and indigo for the emergency or need a week between paycheck things (luckily not often) bc they have the better utilization obviously. I'm fiercely learning to budget, I can make a **bleep** good dinner out of my freezer and pantry, I am thinking 3 times before I buy something that could wait and walking away knowing I put something else toward a CC rather than making the little bit of money disappear on something I don't need. I'm also saving. This is the most I've ever had (aside from the equity I'm getting), which might sound small but I have saved $3500 since April and have never had anything in savings. So it's all working but I just feeling like I want to turn that last corner into the "good zone". Again, thank you for your feedback! I'll take all I can get!

Congratulations on your progress.

As to closing the AF cards, it would not affect your age metrics. Closed accounts in good standing stay on your credit reports for 10 years after closing and continue to contribute to your age metrics just like open accounts.

Re: Rebuilding

FicoMike0 — Tue, 16 Dec 2025 02:21:33 GMT

Congratulations on the progress you've made.

you mention buying a house. There is a mortgage board where you can get expert specific advice. In general, a mortgage is considered a t least a year project. Because of the amount, you really want to squeeze the interest rate, that means work ing scores. You want no new credit for a year prior to application.

Re: Rebuilding

FireMedic1 — Tue, 16 Dec 2025 16:38:51 GMT

@MakeItShine wrote:
Hello! I'm new here and just looking for some tips. I'll give some info, feel free to ask for more. I'm on a serious rebuild post divorce and truly just now (in my 40s) understanding credit. In April 2025 my scores were as low as 540. Today my FICOs are around 650. I have some credit cards, but not main stream ones (credit one (2 of them CL $700/$750), **bleep**’S Mastercard (CL $1500), indigo (CL $2000), mission lane (CL $500), Fortiva (CL $400), PayPal MC (CL $380).

No collections, no car loan, I make about $120k annually. I'm massively rebuilding and learning. My newer cards are the two higher limit ones. I'm right on the cusp of entering "good credit" zone. I desperately want a real credit card to boost my profile, not another subprime, low limit. I should mention I was blacklisted from capital one in the spring which is what launched me into learned what credit really is. They closed all my accounts for "credit cycling" I had no idea I was even doing that, but paying them off frequently and using them to max utilization.

Now my goal is to get all of them under 30%, then under 20%. I'm almost there. But capital one is off the table. Most of the prequals haven't been successful. Are there cards I could consider that start with a real limit? Can't be below $2k or I'm just chasing low utilization. Thank you!

Keep what you got now. Let time do its thing and get total util under 9%. Thats the goal. Big score bump. Use a card that has cash back. Charge it pay it off before the statement cuts. You get the cash back. But dont lose tthe cash back to interest paid. Its a slow process to rebuild. Its a marathon. Not a race. You dont need anymore loans. You have that covered.