Don't touch it til the balances are very low. You'll get the account age to boost your score while getting that high utlilization to bring it down. Not sure if the positive outweighs the negative. As others have said, pay it down and then get the AU status.
BTW, if she has any negatives on that account with late payments, you get those too so be careful.
Also, what kind of balance are you talking about? It might be worthwhile....if she can....to get a generously long intro 0% APR card like Diamond preferred from Citi. You can transfer the balance to that one and pay it down faster. In the meantime, that would put that 10 year old card down to small balance with a good Utli %. You could then get AU status faster without the downside of the high balance.
Start (Sept 2011): low-mid 600s. NOW: TU FICO: 801, EQ FICO 808, EX FICO 798 (PSECU). Goal: Achieved! Now Maintain!
lol...getting conflicting info. No big deal...
The balance isn't as high as I was orininally thinking. She said its around $700, so we could just pay that off this Friday or at the very list pay most of it to leave just a bit revolving. I'll look into the payment history, etc and see if its going to be beneficial. I know she said she doesn't remember being late or missing a payment, but ya never know. Also, with it being nearly 10 yrs old and my cards all being less than 2yrs old. I figured it would hopefully really help my AAoA.
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Sorry, should have read a little further. 
I didn't see that you had stated the balance. I didn't read enough responses. I'll remember that next time. So yeah, in light of the light balance, there's no need to do anything except pay it off to good ratio. Then, provided she has no baddies on it, you're good. I did something similar with my wife. I had two new cards that were only 3-4 months old as well as two new loans within the year. My AAoA dropped a lot. I got her to add me as an AU on her 11 year old card and my score jumped about 30-40 points. Nice boost. Sadly, I had a lot going on at the same time so I'll never know if that was all an AAoA boost or something else going on too. But I think most of it was the AU. My average account age went up a few years over night. My open account age really shot up.
Awesome...thanks. I think we'll make a nice payment then wait for it to report then add me as an AU.
@ztnjpv wrote:lol...getting conflicting info. No big deal...
The balance isn't as high as I was orininally thinking. She said its around $700, so we could just pay that off this Friday or at the very list pay most of it to leave just a bit revolving. I'll look into the payment history, etc and see if its going to be beneficial. I know she said she doesn't remember being late or missing a payment, but ya never know. Also, with it being nearly 10 yrs old and my cards all being less than 2yrs old. I figured it would hopefully really help my AAoA.
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Sorry, should have read a little further.
I didn't see that you had stated the balance. I didn't read enough responses. I'll remember that next time. So yeah, in light of the light balance, there's no need to do anything except pay it off to good ratio. Then, provided she has no baddies on it, you're good. I did something similar with my wife. I had two new cards that were only 3-4 months old as well as two new loans within the year. My AAoA dropped a lot. I got her to add me as an AU on her 11 year old card and my score jumped about 30-40 points. Nice boost. Sadly, I had a lot going on at the same time so I'll never know if that was all an AAoA boost or something else going on too. But I think most of it was the AU. My average account age went up a few years over night. My open account age really shot up.
Revolving utilization is an instant-in-time factor when scoring.
What people were trying to point out is if you add a card with a higher utilization than what you already have outstanding, you're going to take a hit when that AU lands; however, on the premise you're going to pay it down anyway in the future, Wolf3 is absolutely correct: it doesn't matter unless you're planning on applying for something in the near term future.
It's a moot point in other words if you're not applying, add now or add later; personally I'd do it now and just get the bureaucratic nonsense out of the way. Score will recover regardless.
