Hello, long time lurker here! I just wanted to mkae this post for those who are building credit and trying to build their credit completely on their own for the first time and you're young, it can be done!
My Discover It Secured Graduated to a $2,500 CL and unsecured! When I first got this card seven months ago, I only had $200 to put on it because I just got my first real job (I'm 19) and I opened a Self Lender account, but from the personal finance reddit and lurking myFICO, I thought it would be good to have a secured card as well. Then after several months I switched my checking account to Ally Bank from Santander, I decided to not activate my debit card for security reasons, so I added $600 more dollars so I can use my card more frequently. Then in about October, I applied for the Secured CapOne Platinum with $200 (I only had to pay $49 though), just to have another line of credit because my SelfLender will close in about 6 months.
All during this time, my credit score was steadily going up (it when down for a bit when I applied for CapOne, but then once it reported the CLI, it shot up like 40 points.) And once I got my TU score from Discover, it was 712! On CK is was only about 695 so I was happy to see that with such a thin file, I was able to be in the 700s. Now mind you, I always kept my REPORTED utilization below 10%. And then two weeks ago, My Discover graduated to $2,500. I was very surprised, but also not because, I had to pay down the card several times a month because I spent more than $800 a month. But usually it was still less than $2,000 so Discover thought they can trust me with $500 then I thought they would.
I just want to tell others about this to say that they can do it no matter how young they are because a lot of peoople on this forum already had credit before or much older, but I'm still a teenager. I really want to move out (I sleep on my family's couch because I'm a run-away) and buy a car, I thought having a good credit score at such a young age would help show my trust worthiness.
Right now, my score has gone down because TU just saw my HP from CapOne, so now it's 704 and my CK is 694 because I owe $13 more dollar than last time, but I hoping my next report for CK gets me over 700 because they will see my credit limit increase and SelfLender will actually report (they report very late and it's very annoying.)
Edit: Just saw my CK scores both went up to 700. I reached my goal! 
Congrats on the graduation!!!👍👍👍👍
Keep up the good work and Best of Luck!!
😊
Keep up the good work and Best of Luck!!
😊
>
Congratulations on your graduation!
Welcome @Anonymous! Congrats on your success and thanks for supplying some of your data points! You are doing the right thing by trying to stay on top of your credit at an early age. This is something that a lot of us did not do and had to dig out of. Best of luck to you and your goals.
