Post the other day about my PRG, but this one is a thank you, my story, and another question. I've lurked here off an on for the past 18 months and followed a lot of tips. Thank you all for being such a great resource. I'm 32 and didn't even have a credit score until I was 30. My parents had plenty of money and believe in paying for things outright. I remeber being a teenager and getting credit card offers and being told to avoid predatory lenders. I had a full ride through college. No debt. I drove the car my parents gave me for 13 years. Never needed a loan. Then I realized this wouldn't always be the case. Thus began the construction of my credit.
6/14, AU on Dad's AMEX Green card, his only credit card. I used it more than he did and paid the bills.
2/15, Cap1 secured platinum card. Starting limit was a meager $250, but it had my name on it. They bumped it up to $550 after six months.
4/15 Belk card with Synchrony. SL was $650. Auto CLI to $950 after about three months.
8/15 Auto loan. My scores were around 700 at this point. Chase gave the best rate. Took 2-4 hard pulls on reports unfortunately.
Fast forward to this past month, and things have gotten interesting. I had a plan for my future cards. I wanted my own AMEX, the REI card, another travel card, and a solid cash back card. Hopefully I'd get a variety of banks in the mix to diversify. No idea if that matters. Anyway, at the start of this year I began receiving lots of card offers. More than ever before. I assumed my credit report had matured to the point that I could get real, adult credit cards.
2/4, REI Mastercard SL $5,000. I go there a lot and figured this to be the best bet of the cards I wanted. The limited shocked me. I expected much less. Perhaps my credit reports were more ready than I thought.
2/12, AMEX PRG. I know it isn't terribly difficult to get, but this is the one I wanted the most. Before applying I spoke to an AMEX rep who told me my AU status would help, and that 50k bonus points looked great. Got it, already cleared the spending for that bonus. I intended to garden at this point, but you all understand, right?
2/28, requested CLI on the Belk card. They added $2.5k, putting it at $3,450. The old Cap1 secured card is looking really bad now, and a $29 yearly fee is about to kick in. Called and cancelled it.
3/2, CSP with SL of $7k. I couldn't resist. I've seen how popular the card is here, I travel a lot with various airlines, and it gives me my first Visa. I got a prequalified offer in the mail for the 50k bonus, decided it was a card I wanted eventually, so why not? I think Chase loves me going back to the auto loan.
Now we are up to date. Did I do too much too quickly? In the past month I've gone from $1.5k in available credit to $15,450. I should garden, right? That prequalified offer for the Citi DC can wait, right? Or is four new cards no worse than three?
