@jamesdwi wrote:
So having too few is worse than having too many?
I was thinking that if i applied they would see the low limts cards and think this guy already has 9 open TLs, why does he need more?
If i close three of the original ones that would leave me with 6 open TLs, is that about right?
absolutely, there are only a few rare occausions when people are denied with too many cards with low UTL.
I currently have 18 open TL's on my credit report and a 675 FICO and 14% UTL, I have no doubt that I would be approved for any low end card that I applied for instantly. My last four apps were all approved instantly. You will get denied for many prime cards with a 740 Fico if you have only one card reportng unless its very old.
There's a world of difference between 3 credit cards reporting vs. 1... let alone the six he's talking about.
OP: 6 is right around the American average I suspect, go ahead and close 3 if you wish it's not going to matter to your number of open tradelines. Also 18 revolving tradelines would be considered excessive by the vast majority of lenders, the OP has the right idea: if you're not using many of those cards substantially, what's to say you'd use that new tradeline a lender might grant you?
A whole bunch of tradelines certainly establishes one as a statistical outlier, and that's not really a place anyone wants to be in the eyes of a lender... with the corner case exception of fractional top percent earners / spenders.
I would think anything under 1k is a toy limit.
I say anything under $5k is toy.... 
