@Amwar73mf wrote:I messed up my credit during the great recession, lost everything I owned (job, car, house, savings). Now that I've rebuilt my credit score up to the 730s, I'm getting CC offers all over the place. I have three cards now, and two of them have interest free periods I'm going to try to take advantage of. I'm just afraid I'm going to overdo it and get in trouble again.
Right now, I leave my cards at home unless I'm going looking for specific things. I try not to buy necessities with them, although I did charge my car insurance last time, but it was a new card that gave me a $200 cashback if I charge $500 in three months, so getting that made me go ahead and put the insurance on it to get that $200 off. I can definitely pay that balance off before the free interest is done.
I know I should be better about juggling my cards to get the points, but I know myself and it's so tempting to buy more than I can afford just because I have that card. I'm so scared of having to end up paying minimum payments and all that interest again because I got carried away.
So I guess I'm asking if some of you with dozens of cards feel like you have too many, and should I stop here? How do you decide when you have enough cards? I've never had more than two, and I always had that mentality to spend it up to the limit. I'm over that, and trying to stay below 30% of the limit now and pay that off before I charge more. I just don't ever want to get into trouble again.
From what you've described, you have enough cards now. Three is a perfect number of cards to get you to an 850 score some day.
I love these threads because I'll get to see how many cards Mark is up to if he responds.
For me it's become a hobby about seeing how much I can actually maximize my cash back. I pay everything in full every month. I never pay one cent in interest. At this point I have several cards, that I'll just keep open by reloading my Amazon Gift Card once a month. I don't have a single card with an annual fee, and I'd only be interested in opening a card that would fill a hole that I don't already have covered. My plan is to product change my Citi Double Cash to a Citi Custom Cash, that will fill in a hole. Right now my USAlliance Visa gets a flat rate of 3% cash back on everything, but that's only until the end of 2022. If it doesn't get extended (again) then I'll be applying for the AOD Visa Signature to fill that hole. I have my sights set on acquiring a couple Max Cash Preferred cards to cover some 5% cash back hole where I'm currently getting 3% cash back. Also, I think one of the Kroger branded cards would be a nice digital wallet card for filling in anything I missed for 5%.
Aside from trivial charges to keep cards alive, I'm getting somewhere between 3% and 10% cash back on nearly everything now, and have only a few categories where I'm planning to move the 3% to 5%.
It really comes down to whatever you're comfortable managing.
yeah OP, and I'd like to know how many licks to the center of a tootsie pop too 
@Credit12Fico wrote:yeah OP, and I'd to know how many licks to the center of a tootsie pop too
The owl said three
OP, there's something I forgot to say earlier, regarding charging necessities on credit cards. As I said, if you do it carefully, you can come out ahead. A GREAT example of this is cash back on groceries! I use my Amex BCP card for all my grocery purchases, and reap its 6% cash back every month!
For something like groceries, gas, prescriptions, lunch, daily purchases that you're going to make anyway, go ahead and put them on a card--especially a card that rewards you for doing so. Pay the bill in full and you're no worse off than you would've been anyway, since these were purchases you were going to make regardless of payment method.
It's when you start buying things frivolously with CCs that you're likely to get into trouble. Someone else mentioned, and I'll second, that if you're buying things with CCs and other things with cash, you're shooting yourself in the foot. Don't let having credit available fool you into a false sense of "now I can spend a lot more!" Think of it as one or the other: either pay cash for your purchase, or pay by CC, but don't buy DOUBLE just because you can.
