Bombarded with offers - Help?

[Anonymous]

I've been a lurker here for awhile. Relatively short story: My credit history was horrible 7 years ago due to medical debt. Finally they are starting to fall off (4 this month alone which equated to a 45 point bump!). Still 2 left and 1 very old 30 day derog from a bad time period also but those are coming off between now and next year. I'm glad these offers are coming in because the hard work for years starting with a puny $300 secure card to now is showing.  So I was wanting some advice on whether to stay tight or shoot for something. 

Discover is soliciting the hell out of me weekly (sometimes 2 times a week) for the card with the up to 5% cash back. Citi was soliciting me quite a few times before. Funniest thing was they sent me both a Citi ThankYou and Citi Simplicity pre-approval on the same day. I know Amex was also bombarding me but that died off. I can't recall the name but the envelope was green.

Right now my Equifax Fico score is 693.

USBank Secure Card: $300 cl

Capital One: $1000 cl

Capital One: $1750 cl

Best Buy Rewardzone Mastercard: $600 cl (ready to cut that off...)

Nebraska Furniture Mart: $1000 cl

I feel I should stay put for another year, let these age a little more and see how high my score can get before even jumping in. I really really want to get rid of the Secure Card but it was my first real credit card on the path to fixing the past damage. It's about 4 or 5 years old now so keeping the age at least will help until I am comfortable cutting that off finally. Suggestions?

[BrokaToe]

Even if you do cut the secured card loose, as long as it's closed in good standing it will continue to reflect positive history for 10 years on your CR.  Most would probably suggest getting rid of any that have an annual fee.  As long as your util is low enough that is.

[Anonymous]

Capital One's is $39 and I think $15 (ballpark figure). Best Buy is the major stickler at $74. Secured is $35. NFM has no annual fee.

For awhile my util crept up closer to 60% across the board (moving related expenses) but it's gone down substantially and keep it under 10-15% when possible or PIF each month. I don't mind the Cap one annual fee's since it's not bothersome enough to drop yet and those are my highest CL's and I tend to use them the most and PIF or as close to it as possible.

[BrokaToe]

I would think cutting the secured out would be a good step, considering the AF plus the low limit.  That wouldn't hurt your util much, but of course if you've recently paid the AF you would want to wait to close it until it was almost due again.  I didn't realize the Best Buy card had an annual fee like that....ouch  Maybe that one would be a better one to cut.  It's really up to what makes you feel more comfortable from a financial standpoint.

[Anonymous]

It was one of those things where at the time, one of the only cards I was solicited for (BBY) so I took it to help the credit. AF's were paid about 6 or more months ago. If I did cut out the Secured and BBY, now is better. My next oldest besides secure is cap one anyways so my age won't take a significant hit if I ended both. I was going to change banks anyways because USBank has been little to no help. They still will not convert the secure to unsecure because of my old collections...4+ years after paying on time. So my local CU is about to get my business. Take the $300 that would be refunded from secure and give it to the CU 

[BrokaToe]

Now that sounds like a plan! 

[variableResistor]

You can stop the bombardment by placing a promtoial block on your credit report:

https://www.optoutprescreen.com