How many open CC acct's....

[Platinum25]

Currently I have 4 major CC acct's open.  2 with no balances, 2 with low balances, 1 of which gets paid off every month.  (I auto pay all my bills to my AMEX Blue and pay it off every month.)  I have a store CC that has 0% interest expiring in October that has a $2500 balance and so far about $700 in deferred finance charges.  I need to get that paid off here in Sept to avoid the finance charges obviously.  I can either BT to my AMEX with no BT charge but it will be my current rate, which is something around 11%.  I can BT to my Chase card, pay a BT fee and have a lower rate for a limited time, or open a new acct and get 0% for 12 months on the BT.  While I'd like to open a new CC i'm wondering if it would be in my best interest?  5 open majors at one time?  Is that wise?  I don't want to close the 2 accts that have 0 balances on them because of history.  Discuss. 

[Platinum25]

Bump....anyone know how many is too many to have open at a time?

Thanks.

[Anonymous]

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@ChiTownTimmay wrote:

Bump....anyone know how many is too many to have open at a time?

Thanks.

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Number of open account with in reason does not hurt FICO. I had over 20 accounts open at one time and never effected scores. Someone told me they had seen a drop at 30 cards, but probably do to a lowered average age. So here's the deal. Each card that you open gets hit with TOO NEW for 12 months. No biggie. But the real danger is Average Age of Accounts. Each new account you add lowers this age. I say for new "Credit Profiles" (like for an 18 yr old or someone with no credit history) to get them out of the way now so they can age later. But in my case I canceled a bunch of cards before I learned this. I can't just apply for them all over again with out dropping below 6 years. I need to do it slowly. So keep an eye on your average age of accounts. On the good side, more open accounts, more available credit to effect UTL. Hope this helps.

Message Edited by ilovepizza on 09-03-2007 07:11 AM

[Anonymous]

I agree with Pizza especially about that 18 year old get it out of the way but do so in stages.  Youwon't get the best deals right off the bat so age and prove yourself.  Ramping up a lot of new credit will hurt you in a couple of scoring models such as the BK risk score which some banks are now using (Junny for one). It can also flag your accounts and cause issuers to raise rates or lower credit limits. Just be careful.

[Anonymous]

Does anyone know approx how many year(s) each new cc takes off?  Maybe I better not apply for the Discover.  Thanks for the info.  I did not know that.

[MidnightVoice]

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DuckHunter wrote:

Does anyone know approx how many year(s) each new cc takes off?  Maybe I better not apply for the Discover.  Thanks for the info.  I did not know that.

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It depends on the number of accounts on your CRA and their average age

[Anonymous]

Lest say you have 4 cards with an average age of 5.75 years. If you got the 5th card it works like this.

Card 1 2000 = 7 years
Card 2 2002 = 5 years
Card 3 2004 = 3 years
Card 4 1999 = 8 years
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Total = 23 years
Divide by 4 accounts = 5.75 years for average age.

New card 5 2007 = 0 years
Now just add up all the years again and divide by 5 this time.
New average with new card 4.6 years.

You can break it down to months if you want to be more accurate. This was just an example.

Message Edited by ilovepizza on 09-04-2007 07:13 PM