@frankjaeger wrote:Like the title says, I burned them for about $2500. I'm trying to get back in with them since I heard they're the easiest and I burned literally one card from every single major card company
However, they only want to give me a secured card. Should I take it? Or just give it more time to see if they'll offer me a non-secured?
First off, buyer beware!
I say that because like you, I opted for a Capital One Secured Credit card last April, about six weeks after my Discharge; in my case, that was a bad move. Why? The max limit you can put on a CapOne card is $1,000 (with a $849 security deposit); "No problem," I figured, "I'll just pay it off once per week." It turns out given I use push payments from my bank, coupled with multiple payments in any one pay period, the second through nth payments trigger some sort of an Anti Money Laundering protocol and the payments get held for up to 12 days before they are credited to your account. There is also a secondary reason, the scuttlebutt on the internet indicates CapOne is very reluctant to unsecure such cards, even with stellar payment behavior by the card holder.
So, with the above in mind, if a $1,000 cap is good enough for you, and if you can live with not having the card unsecured any time soon, then go for it, CapOne is right for you.
In my case, I closed my secured card with them after only six weeks and opened a secured card at a major bank with a large enough security deposit to cover my normal monthly spend. There are two epilogues to this story:
- The secured card I got from my bank, which was a "Rewards" card collecting 1% cash back, was unsecured in six months and, shock of all shocks, they actually paid interest on the security deposit.
- Almost six months to the day after I closed my CapOne secured card, they sent me a pre-approved E-Mail for a Quicksilver card, I applied, and was approved for $3,000.
Long story short, while I am no fan of CapOne's secured offering, they did right by me with their Quicksilver and I am a happy camper now.
I have to agree that there are better secured cards out there than what Cap1 has to offer. While their unsecured cards are a great tool to help you rebuild without having to turn to the predatory lenders, their secured cards are pretty up in the air as far as the graduation process. I would read up on a few people's post-bk friendly card lineups that they were able to be approved for, pick out a few that fit your spend and start there. Good luck on your journey upward! 
