Hey everyone,
Fresh meat here. This is one of the forums I've lurked on so I thought I'd sign up here to chat.
Backstory: Had a credit card at 18 years of age, 500 limit, they gave me a water bottle with it as a bonus, it was at the jr. college I attended. Promptly maxed it out, Pops paid it off and swore he'd never pay my CC bill again, I cut it up and swore off credit altogther.
Fast forward 16 years or so, mid 30's, I probably need to get some credit if I ever want a house or car loan. Old med bills had fallen off so my score it's decent like 640 or something, but limited history prevents me from applying or getting anything. Cap 1 to the rescue. Call these guys up and ask about a secured card, the guy says "secured card?, homie, you are good for an unsecured card!" I was surprised but they started me out with the rewards MTV card and a 500 dollar limit. This was almost 3 years ago and with regular payments and a couple CLI I got it to $750 fairly quickly and then recently to $3,700.
In Feb or Jan of this year Am Ex starting sniffing around me with all kinds of preapproval offers and when it finally got to the 30,000 miles for the Blue Sky card I jumped on that. I still haven't used all the bonus points yet, I used $100 bucks worth for a hotel and they made the spending requirement pretty easy. So I've been using this card all year and also the MTV which has since been changed to the Journey card occasionally when I needed a Visa.
Current Situation: So, here we are, it's the day before Thanksgiving and I'm thinking about how I'm going to transfer the $5,000 balance I've racked up on my Am Ex. I don't like to carry balances but this has been a rough year where I was under and unemployed for various stretches of time. My income this year was lower than usual, and the 0% apr with the Am Ex really saved me. But now I have a balance and want to work it down. I have steady employment now and my income should be increasing next year, as well. The 0% apr runs out in May of 2015. So I was thinking of transfering the whole balance around then, but then, duh, why don't I just get a new card now and just stop using the Am Ex and pay it off pops into my head. I felt dumb for thinking I had to do this big balance transfer. I had been being solicited by Chase with the Slate and this is what I was thinking of. It was a Eureka moment.
App O Rama: Now despite the fact I've lurked I'd never learned about this concept on these different forums. I came accross the app o rama idea just figuring "why not?" So at this time my credit sesame was at 751 and my credit karma around 729 or so.
So Bam- Had got a preapproval for the Chase Freedom with the $200. App'd and instant approval with a $2,500 limit.
Next day, Thanksgiving- Had a preapproval for the BofA 1-2-3 cash card $100 cash- App'd and instant approval with a $1,500 limit. (found out today it's not the signature, i guess that needs a $5,000 limit.) (They offered me the $150 bonus right after I got approved for the $100 
Few days later- Now addicted to app'ing- Capital One Venture One $200 in travel- not preapproved but online app'd and bam instant approval for $5,000.
My score has since tanked to 715, b-but I don't need to worry, r-right, guys? My credit sesame tanked 40 points and I think my AAoA is like 8 months once they all show up. So my big question. What do I do now? Gardening time? 3 hard pulls since I spaced them out on different days? Should I have done them the same day, does this even matter? I did it all intuitively and didn't plan too hard. I'm learning more and more everyday.
CONGRATS! 
Congrats! Call BoA and ask for the $150 bonus that you were offered after applying. You wont get it if you don't ask. In most instances they will match the offer. Welcome to the forum and thanks for sharing.
Discover IT $17k / US Bank Ace (VSig) $13.5K / US Bank Cash+ (VSig) $13.5k
congrats
@Anonymous wrote:Hey everyone,
Fresh meat here. This is one of the forums I've lurked on so I thought I'd sign up here to chat.
Backstory: Had a credit card at 18 years of age, 500 limit, they gave me a water bottle with it as a bonus, it was at the jr. college I attended. Promptly maxed it out, Pops paid it off and swore he'd never pay my CC bill again, I cut it up and swore off credit altogther.
Fast forward 16 years or so, mid 30's, I probably need to get some credit if I ever want a house or car loan. Old med bills had fallen off so my score it's decent like 640 or something, but limited history prevents me from applying or getting anything. Cap 1 to the rescue. Call these guys up and ask about a secured card, the guy says "secured card?, homie, you are good for an unsecured card!" I was surprised but they started me out with the rewards MTV card and a 500 dollar limit. This was almost 3 years ago and with regular payments and a couple CLI I got it to $750 fairly quickly and then recently to $3,700.
In Feb or Jan of this year Am Ex starting sniffing around me with all kinds of preapproval offers and when it finally got to the 30,000 miles for the Blue Sky card I jumped on that. I still haven't used all the bonus points yet, I used $100 bucks worth for a hotel and they made the spending requirement pretty easy. So I've been using this card all year and also the MTV which has since been changed to the Journey card occasionally when I needed a Visa.
Current Situation: So, here we are, it's the day before Thanksgiving and I'm thinking about how I'm going to transfer the $5,000 balance I've racked up on my Am Ex. I don't like to carry balances but this has been a rough year where I was under and unemployed for various stretches of time. My income this year was lower than usual, and the 0% apr with the Am Ex really saved me. But now I have a balance and want to work it down. I have steady employment now and my income should be increasing next year, as well. The 0% apr runs out in May of 2015. So I was thinking of transfering the whole balance around then, but then, duh, why don't I just get a new card now and just stop using the Am Ex and pay it off pops into my head. I felt dumb for thinking I had to do this big balance transfer. I had been being solicited by Chase with the Slate and this is what I was thinking of. It was a Eureka moment.
App O Rama: Now despite the fact I've lurked I'd never learned about this concept on these different forums. I came accross the app o rama idea just figuring "why not?" So at this time my credit sesame was at 751 and my credit karma around 729 or so.
So Bam- Had got a preapproval for the Chase Freedom with the $200. App'd and instant approval with a $2,500 limit.
Next day, Thanksgiving- Had a preapproval for the BofA 1-2-3 cash card $100 cash- App'd and instant approval with a $1,500 limit. (found out today it's not the signature, i guess that needs a $5,000 limit.) (They offered me the $150 bonus right after I got approved for the $100
Few days later- Now addicted to app'ing- Capital One Venture One $200 in travel- not preapproved but online app'd and bam instant approval for $5,000.
My score has since tanked to 715, b-but I don't need to worry, r-right, guys? My credit sesame tanked 40 points and I think my AAoA is like 8 months once they all show up. So my big question. What do I do now? Gardening time? 3 hard pulls since I spaced them out on different days? Should I have done them the same day, does this even matter? I did it all intuitively and didn't plan too hard. I'm learning more and more everyday.
Congratulations
