Like others said, waiting is probably best but if you are dying to get a high(er) limit card now, you can try a Soft Pull Pre-Qual card that will show your credit limit before you accept (and get a Hard Pull). The below thread is a bit dated but can be a good place to start.
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@jackhughes wrote:They fall of my report in December its would have been 2 years at that point.
Then the hard pulls are not the issue. Most issuers look back only 1 year.
Aven:
@dfwxjer escribió:Charge a tank of gas, or something similar, each month and let it report then pay that off.
Don't use the other two cards.
Use your debit card for every single other purchase in the month. Continue this for 4-6 months and your score will jump. Unfortunately, your current cards are not "daily drivers" so trying to run everything through them right now will just delay your progress and cause frustration. The bit of rewards you'll miss out on is insignificant at best.
After you practice the above discipline you should see offers for $5-10k credit limits where you can effectively move all your spend to cards to begin earning rewards.
Good luck!
I'm sorry, but this is not good advice.
Recommending the usage of debit over credit, outside of being in a situation where one is trying to pay down balances that are being carried on cards that are actively accruing interest, would lead to unnecessary exposure in a time where identity theft and hacking methods are becoming increasingly sophisticated.
If the problem is low limits, not using 2 cards at all is not going to be a solution. In fact, lack of usage of current credit lines is an often-issued reason for denial of a CLI. Cycling spend through cards helps to justify the need for a CLI, as well as provides the CC issuer with profit off of the transaction fees. An unused card does nothing for the issuer, which is why they are at risk of being closed after long periods of disuse.
OP's score is not the issue. A 730 is not a troubling FICO score, by any means. While AZEO does help to maximize your FICO score at any given moment, utilization is very much a dynamic credit-scoring metric that is likely to change from one month to another with regular usage. Furthermore, if controlling reported utilization were OP's goal, rather than not using the cards, he could just make sure to pay them off a couple days before the statement close date. That way, he would be pushing through justified spending and still reporting a zero balance to the 3 CRAs. By the way, credit cycling is hardly an issue when it is normal spend on cards with low limits. I believe issuers would expect for $2,000 ran through a $500-limit card in a month to be less suspicious than $30,000 ran through a card with a $5,000 limit, in the same span of time.
This is likely a profile issue. As was stated earlier, time (and in the same vein, consistency) is likely the metric you're dealing with. There is a young profile with several hard inquiries (that, while not counting towards your score, can certainly count when considering CLIs) and exclusively low limits. Perhaps AZEO would help OP out, a bit, if he is eligible, time-wise, for a CLI because I could also see how having all of the cards reporting high utilization at the time of the application could cause the issuers to give pause. Due to variances in information reported, there is often no way for the issuer to know whether the 80% or > utilization rates on cards from the other issuers are being consistently paid in full or are being carried from one month to the next.
@jackhughes Just keep trying. Practicing AZEO cannot hurt you. Do that while maintaining your normal spend and you should eventually be granted a CLI. Also, in the case of Chase, don't be afraid to call in for the CLI and explain that you really just need a workable limit. Having someone individually look at your request on reconsideration can bear fruit.
@dfwxjer wrote:
@PayAndProsper wrote:
@dfwxjer escribió:Charge a tank of gas, or something similar, each month and let it report then pay that off.
Don't use the other two cards.
Use your debit card for every single other purchase in the month. Continue this for 4-6 months and your score will jump. Unfortunately, your current cards are not "daily drivers" so trying to run everything through them right now will just delay your progress and cause frustration. The bit of rewards you'll miss out on is insignificant at best.
After you practice the above discipline you should see offers for $5-10k credit limits where you can effectively move all your spend to cards to begin earning rewards.
Good luck!
I'm sorry, but this is not good advice.
Recommending the usage of debit over credit, outside of being in a situation where one is trying to pay down balances that are being carried on cards that are actively accruing interest, would lead to unnecessary exposure in a time where identity theft and hacking methods are becoming increasingly sophisticated.
If the problem is low limits, not using 2 cards at all is not going to be a solution. In fact, lack of usage of current credit lines is an often-issued reason for denial of a CLI. Cycling spend through cards helps to justify the need for a CLI, as well as provides the CC issuer with profit off of the transaction fees. An unused card does nothing for the issuer, which is why they are at risk of being closed after long periods of disuse.
OP's score is not the issue. A 730 is not a troubling FICO score, by any means. While AZEO does help to maximize your FICO score at any given moment, utilization is very much a dynamic credit-scoring metric that is likely to change from one month to another with regular usage. Furthermore, if controlling reported utilization were OP's goal, rather than not using the cards, he could just make sure to pay them off a couple days before the statement close date. That way, he would be pushing through justified spending and still reporting a zero balance to the 3 CRAs. By the way, credit cycling is hardly an issue when it is normal spend on cards with low limits. I believe issuers would expect for $2,000 ran through a $500-limit card in a month to be less suspicious than $30,000 ran through a card with a $5,000 limit, in the same span of time.
This is likely a profile issue. As was stated earlier, time (and in the same vein, consistency) is likely the metric you're dealing with. There is a young profile with several hard inquiries (that, while not counting towards your score, can certainly count when considering CLIs) and exclusively low limits. Perhaps AZEO would help OP out, a bit, if he is eligible, time-wise, for a CLI because I could also see how having all of the cards reporting high utilization at the time of the application could cause the issuers to give pause. Due to variances in information reported, there is often no way for the issuer to know whether the 80% or > utilization rates on cards from the other issuers are being consistently paid in full or are being carried from one month to the next.
@jackhughes Just keep trying. Practicing AZEO cannot hurt you. Do that while maintaining your normal spend and you should eventually be granted a CLI. Also, in the case of Chase, don't be afraid to call in for the CLI and explain that you really just need a workable limit. Having someone individually look at your request on reconsideration can bear fruit.
My advice is proven to work. I've helped numerous people using the exact path I detailed out, and within 4-6 months their profile is strong enough to apply for prime cards with higher limits. My plan is not intended to 10-20x CLI his current cards. A bucketed Cap1 card won't grow to a worthwhile limit so there's no reason to power cycle it throughout the month. The Chase card will grow with time, and organic CLIs will come along the way. The path I laid out will help the OP obtain prime cards with much better SLs.
I think the benefit of obtaining prime cards with healthy SLs is worth the slight risk of using a debit card for 4-6 months. If this is a paralyzing fear then sign up for a secured card by putting up a significant deposit. BofA is one of the better ones for this route.
dfw, I'm kinda with PAP on this one too. I didn't really understand any benefits to your advice. First sentence regarding the tank of gas - are you saying to carry a balance and pay interest? I don't think anyone has to ever pay interest to improve their credit score. And why use a debit card? Unless OP is carrying balances and paying interest and attempting to pay down those balances, there is no reason not to use credit cards for purchases (I'm assuming the OP PIFs, they didn't say otherwise). Why would using his current credit cards "just delay your progress and cause frustration"? Sorry, I just don't get it! 
@ptatohed wrote:
@dfwxjer wrote:
@PayAndProsper wrote:
@dfwxjer escribió:Charge a tank of gas, or something similar, each month and let it report then pay that off.
Don't use the other two cards.
Use your debit card for every single other purchase in the month. Continue this for 4-6 months and your score will jump. Unfortunately, your current cards are not "daily drivers" so trying to run everything through them right now will just delay your progress and cause frustration. The bit of rewards you'll miss out on is insignificant at best.
After you practice the above discipline you should see offers for $5-10k credit limits where you can effectively move all your spend to cards to begin earning rewards.
Good luck!
I'm sorry, but this is not good advice.
Recommending the usage of debit over credit, outside of being in a situation where one is trying to pay down balances that are being carried on cards that are actively accruing interest, would lead to unnecessary exposure in a time where identity theft and hacking methods are becoming increasingly sophisticated.
If the problem is low limits, not using 2 cards at all is not going to be a solution. In fact, lack of usage of current credit lines is an often-issued reason for denial of a CLI. Cycling spend through cards helps to justify the need for a CLI, as well as provides the CC issuer with profit off of the transaction fees. An unused card does nothing for the issuer, which is why they are at risk of being closed after long periods of disuse.
OP's score is not the issue. A 730 is not a troubling FICO score, by any means. While AZEO does help to maximize your FICO score at any given moment, utilization is very much a dynamic credit-scoring metric that is likely to change from one month to another with regular usage. Furthermore, if controlling reported utilization were OP's goal, rather than not using the cards, he could just make sure to pay them off a couple days before the statement close date. That way, he would be pushing through justified spending and still reporting a zero balance to the 3 CRAs. By the way, credit cycling is hardly an issue when it is normal spend on cards with low limits. I believe issuers would expect for $2,000 ran through a $500-limit card in a month to be less suspicious than $30,000 ran through a card with a $5,000 limit, in the same span of time.
This is likely a profile issue. As was stated earlier, time (and in the same vein, consistency) is likely the metric you're dealing with. There is a young profile with several hard inquiries (that, while not counting towards your score, can certainly count when considering CLIs) and exclusively low limits. Perhaps AZEO would help OP out, a bit, if he is eligible, time-wise, for a CLI because I could also see how having all of the cards reporting high utilization at the time of the application could cause the issuers to give pause. Due to variances in information reported, there is often no way for the issuer to know whether the 80% or > utilization rates on cards from the other issuers are being consistently paid in full or are being carried from one month to the next.
@jackhughes Just keep trying. Practicing AZEO cannot hurt you. Do that while maintaining your normal spend and you should eventually be granted a CLI. Also, in the case of Chase, don't be afraid to call in for the CLI and explain that you really just need a workable limit. Having someone individually look at your request on reconsideration can bear fruit.
My advice is proven to work. I've helped numerous people using the exact path I detailed out, and within 4-6 months their profile is strong enough to apply for prime cards with higher limits. My plan is not intended to 10-20x CLI his current cards. A bucketed Cap1 card won't grow to a worthwhile limit so there's no reason to power cycle it throughout the month. The Chase card will grow with time, and organic CLIs will come along the way. The path I laid out will help the OP obtain prime cards with much better SLs.
I think the benefit of obtaining prime cards with healthy SLs is worth the slight risk of using a debit card for 4-6 months. If this is a paralyzing fear then sign up for a secured card by putting up a significant deposit. BofA is one of the better ones for this route.
dfw, I'm kinda with PAP on this one too. I didn't really understand any benefits to your advice. First sentence regarding the tank of gas - are you saying to carry a balance and pay interest? I don't think anyone has to ever pay interest to improve their credit score. And why use a debit card? Unless OP is carrying balances and paying interest and attempting to pay down those balances, there is no reason not to use credit cards for purchases (I'm assuming the OP PIFs, they didn't say otherwise). Why would using his current credit cards "just delay your progress and cause frustration"? Sorry, I just don't get it!
I always use "tank of gas" for the arbitrary charge I'm talking about... but essentially I mean let a small balance report on one of the cards that won't exceed 10% of the current credit limit. Then once the statement cuts, pay off the entire balance in full. I'd never advocate for paying interest in any scenario.
The benefit of my plan is to build the OP's credit profile without putzing around with beginner cards with low limits. Like I said in my initial post here, the cards the OP currently holds are not daily driver cards with limits high enough to run an entire month's worth of expenses through. Credit cycling is a hassle and can even lead to accounts being flagged for this behavior. Banks don't like to see the card maxed out, paid off, and maxed out again in a single billing cycle. The system does not account for the increased swipe fees, and only focuses on the cardholder running more through the card than their underwriting system approved it for.
The Chase card is the only one out of the 3 that will grow and build a relationship with a worthwhile bank. However, the OP is looking for bigger limits sooner than later, so I spelled out a disciplined plan to obtain prime cards, not putzing around with asking for CLIs on low limit starter cards. PayPal/Synchrony and a bucketed Cap1 card aren't worth dealing with at all imo.
in short, my focus is on getting the OP in to a prime card with a high SL in the shortest most efficient way possible. Low limit cards aren't worth the effort most of the time.