Utilization

[Anonymous]

I would look at rolling the two WAMU accounts together. You should be able to get the lower interest rate for the new CL. Watch the age of the accounts though because you do not want to eliminate the oldest (unless they are real close to the same age). WAMU does have good transfer offers from time to time, but their transaction fee is 5%. It does cap at $150 where a lot of cards are removing caps all together.

You stated that you were interested in paying down debt while increasing FICO at the beginning of the thread. Depending on short or long term time frames would answer the question about what to pay down first.The SeaMiles and Best Buy are at zero now, but they will default back to a higher rate at some point. Depending how far out that is and at what interest rate would assist in making a better decision. I am a proponet of the "game", but I also feel that FICO points can always be regained in the mid or long term where interest expense is NEVER regained. My inclination would be that less than 10% of your debt is in the 20%+ range so I would get rid of that ASAP and stick them in the sock drawer. I see 20% interest rates as blood suckers and need to be removed as soon as possible. Otherwise, I would reduce the SeaMiles as aggresively as I could before the bomb goes off. Shoot for no more than 50% on any one account and then go for 35% as soon as you achieve the first goal.

You will get there! Good Luck!

[haulingthescoreup]

Grit your teeth, use the HOLIDAY25 25% off discount code, and pull your 3 FICO scores. You deserve it! Let us know what your real scores are. And then keep bashing away at the balances.

I finally managed to get only 4 out of my total 8 active accounts (including mortgage and student loan) showing balances, and only 2 of my total 6 revolving (5 CC's + a HELOC) showing balances, and I got a 14-point jump on TU. (The others went up too, see my sig line.) TU especially has Issues with half or more of revolving accounts reporting.

Your long-time goal should be having only a few CC's reporting a balance each month. At the moment, you have 12 CC's, so the max reporting balances at any given time should be 5. Not 6, TU gives you love when you're UNDER half of cards reporting. If you have to carry balances, it's easiest to pay off the little CL cards and let the larger carry balances under 10%. This will also make your life a bunch simpler!

[Niki9]

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prowen wrote:

I would look at rolling the two WAMU accounts together. You should be able to get the lower interest rate for the new CL. Watch the age of the accounts though because you do not want to eliminate the oldest (unless they are real close to the same age). WAMU does have good transfer offers from time to time, but their transaction fee is 5%. It does cap at $150 where a lot of cards are removing caps all together.

You stated that you were interested in paying down debt while increasing FICO at the beginning of the thread. Depending on short or long term time frames would answer the question about what to pay down first.The SeaMiles and Best Buy are at zero now, but they will default back to a higher rate at some point. Depending how far out that is and at what interest rate would assist in making a better decision. I am a proponet of the "game", but I also feel that FICO points can always be regained in the mid or long term where interest expense is NEVER regained. My inclination would be that less than 10% of your debt is in the 20%+ range so I would get rid of that ASAP and stick them in the sock drawer. I see 20% interest rates as blood suckers and need to be removed as soon as possible. Otherwise, I would reduce the SeaMiles as aggresively as I could before the bomb goes off. Shoot for no more than 50% on any one account and then go for 35% as soon as you achieve the first goal.

You will get there! Good Luck!

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The sea miles is a brand new card. I did the BT with them for the 0% but now I can't remember if it was for 1 year or 6 months.  Either way when it goes back, it will be 13% (which is the lowest rate that I have right now.)

My WaMu cards are about 1 year apart.  They have never given me cli.  When I ask they said they don't do that.  How do I get them to become 1 card?

[Niki9]

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haulingthescoreup wrote:
Grit your teeth, use the HOLIDAY25 25% off discount code, and pull your 3 FICO scores. You deserve it! Let us know what your real scores are. And then keep bashing away at the balances.

I finally managed to get only 4 out of my total 8 active accounts (including mortgage and student loan) showing balances, and only 2 of my total 6 revolving (5 CC's + a HELOC) showing balances, and I got a 14-point jump on TU. (The others went up too, see my sig line.) TU especially has Issues with half or more of revolving accounts reporting.

Your long-time goal should be having only a few CC's reporting a balance each month. At the moment, you have 12 CC's, so the max reporting balances at any given time should be 5. Not 6, TU gives you love when you're UNDER half of cards reporting. If you have to carry balances, it's easiest to pay off the little CL cards and let the larger carry balances under 10%. This will also make your life a bunch simpler!

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Thanks for the info. 

here are the scores from MyFico

TU 666 as of 10/28

EX 619 as of 10/28

EQ 684 as of 11/21

I will pull again in DEC or JAN - (unless scorewatch shows a big jump)

not all of the cards are reporting yet.

target, QVC, Nordies, SeaMiles and Hooters are all new.

[Anonymous]

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prowen wrote:

I would look at rolling the two WAMU accounts together. You should be able to get the lower interest rate for the new CL. Watch the age of the accounts though because you do not want to eliminate the oldest (unless they are real close to the same age). WAMU does have good transfer offers from time to time, but their transaction fee is 5%. It does cap at $150 where a lot of cards are removing caps all together.

You stated that you were interested in paying down debt while increasing FICO at the beginning of the thread. Depending on short or long term time frames would answer the question about what to pay down first.The SeaMiles and Best Buy are at zero now, but they will default back to a higher rate at some point. Depending how far out that is and at what interest rate would assist in making a better decision. I am a proponet of the "game", but I also feel that FICO points can always be regained in the mid or long term where interest expense is NEVER regained. My inclination would be that less than 10% of your debt is in the 20%+ range so I would get rid of that ASAP and stick them in the sock drawer. I see 20% interest rates as blood suckers and need to be removed as soon as possible. Otherwise, I would reduce the SeaMiles as aggresively as I could before the bomb goes off. Shoot for no more than 50% on any one account and then go for 35% as soon as you achieve the first goal.

You will get there! Good Luck!

---

The sea miles is a brand new card. I did the BT with them for the 0% but now I can't remember if it was for 1 year or 6 months.  Either way when it goes back, it will be 13% (which is the lowest rate that I have right now.)

My WaMu cards are about 1 year apart.  They have never given me cli.  When I ask they said they don't do that.  How do I get them to become 1 card?

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The CL I was referring to is $7K on one card rather than two. WaMu has done CLI on my card, but they may have been when they felt like it as opposed to my request. I can't honstly remember on that one. I have rolled together Chase and BOA cards with no problem simply by asking their CSR. I did pick up a CLI when I did BOA. With Chase I was combining three cards and I did not ask for a CLI. It is more for flexiblity than anything else. One larger CL is simply easier to work with than two with smaller CLs.

Downside to WaMu is you have to request past statements and they email info. You want to know your current interest rate? Search for APR and they tell you to go look at a physical statement or call CS. Unique from any other card I have seen. The free FAKO is nice though. It has not deviated from my TU FICO more than 2% when I have pulled together. (They pull FAKO right at the first of the month and then publish any where from a week to two weeks later). All in all, a good card for the portfolio. None of them are perfect. In my book it is a really nice Prime card.

SeaMiles is just an excercise in reducuing for util then. Wipe out the little stuff and focus on it.