Pay each card balance to zero or spread payments to all cards ?

[cam75]

As I see from the responses I should have also wrote that I do have other lines of credit . The other credit cards have zero balances since I did start by paying off the cards with the highest interest rates so currently I am utilizing 55 percent of my total credit availability . The cards I listed are the last of my aprox 10 credit cards and since I want to refinance asap Imam looking to see what the best way to handle the last four accounts would be using the last aprox &3000 before I go into the bank to start the refinance.

[HiLine]

My suggestion still applies. Having even just 1 card maxed out is going to harm your credit a lot. 

[Booner72]

I've only lost 5 points and the maxed card has reported in addition to the other accounts that are still reporting balances because they haven't updated to zero yet.

[Revelate]

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@Booner72 wrote:
I've only lost 5 points and the maxed card has reported in addition to the other accounts that are still reporting balances because they haven't updated to zero yet.

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Depends what else is in your file.  I dropped from 660 -> 646 as a result of maxxing out a card (like 98%) one month as a result of high balance setting.  14 points is non-trivial in the mid-600's when trying to refinance anything.  Trying my little experiment again this time maxxing out a 3K line but it's a higher overall revolving utilization and I got sloppy with my PIF balances unfortunately so not quite as applicable, but if I were just trying to bump FICO short term, I'd pay everything under approximately 75% and then zero as many cards as possible.

[indiolatino61]

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@cam75 wrote:

I have 4 credit cards that are maxed . 1) 1300.  2) 1400 3) 5400 4) 6300 my fico is 657 and I want to refinance asap . Is is better to pay each down to zero at a time or should I take the same amount of money I am putting towards credit cards and pay them all down at the same time . For example Im thinking Ill pay $3000 on cards over the next 2 months before I go refinance so should I pay off the 2 smaller cards to $0 and have 2 cards maxed  or divide the $3000 across the cards?

    Also I should add that I have a total of 10 credit cards but the other cards were the ones with the highest interest rates so I paid them off to zero already . I am currently utilizing 55 percent of my total credit .

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There's little worse than maxing out cards, so I would think paying evenly, percentage wise, not dollar wise, would be better. That way none of the cards will be maxed out and your utilization would drop accordingly. Good luck to you.