Closing unused accounts “Gardening?”

[tech-d]

Hi all!

As you can see from my signature, I've added a new card and have gotten about $10k in additional credit via CLIs and the new card in the past 6 months. The new Blue Cash AmEx came without a hard pull.

I'm thinking about closing the Cap1 card, because it has near useless rewards at this point compared to the others, and they've shot me down for CLIs several times for non-use. But it's 5 and a half years old. But also has a $30 yearly fee which they've always credited me back.

I'm barely carrying a balance on the HSBC card and I'll be done paying off the Discover card at the end of the month. It only has $500 left on it.

That leaves me with 4 cards less than 2 years old and potentially closing my 3rd oldest card.

Should I close it? Call and request to cancel with that low of a credit limit and see if they respond to that?

Last factor in this: Now that I have next to no debt, I'm saving money for a house(!) and plan on getting a mortgage in the next year or two. Or at least starting that process because it takes ages.

Thoughts? Suggestions?

And thanks to everyone here, I'm almost revolving debt free and have substantial assets! So motivating!

[Remedios]

"Threats" don't work, since there is nothing threatening to a lender with millions of customers about closing a single account.

It might help you get it closed faster, though. 

[tech-d]

Very true. I thought they might have some "customer retention" thing, but you basically put it in clear words. Thanks!

(to be clear, I should have worded that better in my initial post, and have reworked that in the edit)

[KatSoDak]

I also have an HSBC card I don't use much which I planned to close but now I'm going to wait to see what happens after Citizens and Cathay take over U.S. accounts. I'm not really sure if credit cards are affected, especially for those of us who don't have other HSBC accounts.

If you don't want to fool with a card why not close it? 

Unless it is an old card that helps age of accounts I suppose. But even closed cards are reported for years.

My oldest card is WF Cashwise which I PC'd to from Platinum and I recently reallocated all but 1k from it to my Propel Card. I'm tossing around closing the Cashwise but now that rumor says another WF card will be introduced in July I will wait and see if it's something I want and if a PC is possible.

Don't do anything you think you'll regret. I mean there is no rush on closing cards is there?