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My recommendation would be get one credit union card and one bank card. Having a long relationship with both a major bank and a credit union could be useful in the future when applying for mortgages or auto loans etc.
Capital one is mastercard primarily
Chase is Visa primarily
The only CUs I am familiar with are military based so I cant recommend, but this might be a good place for a AMEX card.
Whatever bank/CUs you go with, open a savings with 100 bucks first/at the same time. Banks like when you use multiple of their products. As an aside I like cap1 because they will let you upgrade your card while keeping your open date. Great news for your average age of accounts.
I went to the AMEX site that PrinceofLA suggested, I did not prequalify for AMX BCE. - There were 3 cards that I qualified for AMEX Everyday CC, Premier Rewards Gold Card, AMEX Green Card. Confused because when I pulled up my account in Credit Karma it recommended 3 cards with very good approval odd AMEX BCE Preferred AMEX BCE ED and CHASE FU. It also stated good approval odds for BOA Cash Rewards and Citi Double Cash.....My Discover Scorecard says my Fico 8 Score is 768. Any suggestions, advice, guidance, etc would be greatly appreciated
Use Karma to learn about the products, but don't bank on their approval odds. They can be way off.
AMEX underwriting seems to be about the same for all of their revolvers. If you qualify for one, you'll likely qualify for another.
I am sorry I am in class when responding earlier I missed this post. I was not offered the AMEX BCE Preferred and Everyday card on AMEX prequalify site. I was offered AMEX Everyday CC, Rewards Gold CC and Green Card. When I pull up my account in Credit Karma I am offered AMEX BCE Preferred and Everyday card and Chase FU with very good approval odd, not sure if these are just marketing ploys. If they are not just marketing ploys should I apply for both on CK site at same time AMEX BCE and Chase FU
@Anonymous wrote:I went to the AMEX site that PrinceofLA suggested, I did not prequalify for AMX BCE. - There were 3 cards that I qualified for AMEX Everyday CC, Premier Rewards Gold Card, AMEX Green Card. Confused because when I pulled up my account in Credit Karma it recommended 3 cards with very good approval odd AMEX BCE Preferred AMEX BCE ED and CHASE FU. It also stated good approval odds for BOA Cash Rewards and Citi Double Cash.....My Discover Scorecard says my Fico 8 Score is 768. Any suggestions, advice, guidance, etc would be greatly appreciated
Ditto on the revolving Amex lines. By Discover Scorecard I assume you mean the TransUnion 08 score they give you in your Discover account each month? If you go to creditscorecard.com that is also Discover, but will be the Experian FICO 08 score that Amex will use. Unless your Experian FICO 08 score is drastically different than your TransUnion FICO 08 score, it is pretty much a guarantee that you will have an approval from Amex on any card they offer. Keep in mind they only show 3 cards at once, so that doesn't mean you wouldn't be approved for others.
As for Credit Karma, they don't even have a score from Experian so they couldn't use that as a basis for qualifying you for Amex anyway. All of their odds are purely marketing. For what it's worth, my Vantage scores (used by Credit Karma and other, but not credit card lenders) are about 100 points lower than my FICO scores and they tell me I have poor odds for every card in my signature that they list in their marketing! LOL
To answer your post that came through while I was typing that, I would not apply for anything through Credit Karma (but maybe that's just me).
Apping directly with the lender would likely be the best bet.
For prequalifying with Chase, I would look here: https://www.chase.com/prequalified
For prequalifying with BoA, I wouild look here: https://secure.bankofamerica.com/login/eclo/entry/findCustomizedOffer.go
For prequalifying with Citi, I would go here: https://www.citicards.com/cards/credit/application/flow.action?isInvitation=N
K-in-Boston
Thank you for responding when I went to the Chase Prequal link you sent, these are the cards that I pre-qualified for. Just wondering if I should consider getting a card with dining and travel. I know over the Christmas holidays I will be eating out with friends when I go home and I usually go to a bowl game if Louisville makes it. I also usually go to Final Four tournaments, unfortunately, I think it's safe to say UL won't be going to the Final Four anytime in the near future. I am open to any advice on what might be the best cards to have to start out with. other than cash back. Also, should I apply for both cards today
Chase Sapphire Preferred®PREMIUM TRAVEL & DINING REWARDS, Chase Slate®LOW INTRO RATE & MONTHLY FICO® SCORE FOR FREE
Chase Freedom®CASH BACK & LOW INTRO APR, Chase Freedom Unlimited®UNLIMITED 1.5% CASH BACK
@Anonymous wrote:Responders, I am so new to this forum.......I have been applying to each of you that responded not even realizing that you all can see the responses. I am sorry, I am very appreciative of each response your time and advice and wanted to acknowledge each one of you. I am open to all cards.....My goal is to have a DISCOVER, AMEX, VISA and MC. I would appreciate any advice on a time frame for applying for cards and can I apply for more than one card at the same time? if so, how many should I apply for? If not how long should I wait. Thank you all in advance for your responses. Please don't get become frustrated with my lack of understanding the process
Hi @Anonymous, and welcome to myFICO!
If you're on desktop this might help a bit as well...
How to quote a post: http://ficoforums.myfico.com/t5/Community-Feature-FAQ-s/How-to-Quote-a-Post/td-p/2603189
@Anonymous wrote:K-in-Boston
Thank you for responding when I went to the Chase Prequal link you sent, these are the cards that I pre-qualified for. Just wondering if I should consider getting a card with dining and travel. I know over the Christmas holidays I will be eating out with friends when I go home and I usually go to a bowl game if Louisville makes it. I also usually go to Final Four tournaments, unfortunately, I think it's safe to say UL won't be going to the Final Four anytime in the near future. I am open to any advice on what might be the best cards to have to start out with. other than cash back. Also, should I apply for both cards today
Chase Sapphire Preferred®PREMIUM TRAVEL & DINING REWARDS, Chase Slate®LOW INTRO RATE & MONTHLY FICO® SCORE FOR FREE
Chase Freedom®CASH BACK & LOW INTRO APR, Chase Freedom Unlimited®UNLIMITED 1.5% CASH BACK
What APR does it list for each of those cards when you prequalify? (Just want to make sure it's not marketing.) As stated earlier, the Chase Sapphire products while great travel cards may not be a good choice as Chase usually likes to not be the first to give someone a large credit line and the CSP has a minimum $5,000 credit line. It also has a fantastic signup bonus of 50,000 UR points but I'm not sure what your resources are as a student, so the $4,000 in spend required to get the bonus might be prohibitive as well. Chase Slate is not a good option for you - that's a card really meant for balance transfers and has no other redeeming value besides a free Equifax 08 Card Enhanced score each month.
Travel rewards and cash back rewards are two very different beasts, so recommendations will change greatly depending on which you want. If you just want cash back for travel and dining purchases, then cards like the Chase Freedom, Freedom Unlimited, and Citi Double Cash would be viable options. Freedom has rotating 5% categories (restaurants are included at least once every year, and some form of travel is usually included as a 5% category but that can vary) but is otherwise only 1% back. Freedom Unlimited would be 1.5% back on everything and Double Cash would be 2% back on everything. If you want travel rewards (rather than just cash back for travel purchases), then you'd kind of need to let us know which airline(s) and hotel(s) you prefer, if any.
The Chase Saphire Preferred is probably a good travel card to start with. A few obstacles though come to mind. One, the signup bonus is a shame to waste since it's one of the best out there. If you can't meet the $4k spend in 3 months I would hold off on it til it makes more sense to get it. Another is Chase likes to see you have prior experience with moderately sized limit since the CSP starts off at a minimum $5k SL. So I would maybe hold off on a travel card til your credit expands a bit more.