Maybe it was my trip to Vegas last weekend, maybe it was the confidence instilled in me from my recent Apple Card approval for 10k but I decided to roll the dice today on a few apps.
1) I signed up for Affinity FCU membership in Jan and parked a few grand in their savings account with the hopes of getting a quarterly pre-qual down the road. Here I am just over a day from the July refresh but I didn't want to wait. Submitted the app for Cash Rewards which was accepted so now the waiting game begins.
2) Because I don't like waiting I decided to put in two more apps that require me to wait. I got the US Bank Cash+ secured and Altitude GO secured just over 6 months ago each for 5k. I know, I know you're supposed to have the cards for a year before requesting an upgrade to unsecured based on some research on their website. When I got them I was in the low to mid 500s and as of now each of my FICO 8 scores are in the low 700s. After a lot of googling I did find a few references to being able to request unsecuring them after 6 months. 10k is a decent amount to have held up and it's only a few hard pulls. I called up and told them I was wondering if I could put in a request to unsecure the cards, the rep didn't bat an eye and said absolutely. Both requests submitted this afternoon and now I get to check my mailbox obsessively. No hard pull yet but we shall see. If all else fails and I get sent to denial town on the above I'm pretty confident that I can get a decent limit on a 2nd Navy Fed card as they unsecured my nRewards after the last statement cut. I'll keep you guys updated!
Update 1July: Still no hard pull notification from US Bank which is surprising given their propensity for doing so. I'd be shocked if I got an upgrade with a soft pull so I'm guessing I rolled a snake eyes on upgrading the cards but we'll see if anything comes in the mail next week.
Update 5 July: Got the denial letters for my US Bank secured cards in the mail today. Confirmed that they want 12 months of on time payments before unsecuring the cards. No other points listed and it was not a hard pull (did see a soft inquiry on TU by US Bank account review after the application). I knew this one was a long shot so no biggie, will do it again in 6 months and hopefully all good. Still no word from Affinity FCU on Cash Rewards.
Update 8 July: Got the Affinity approval! Link to post if anyone is interested in the comment below.
