What to do next? I have 28 accounts in good standings!!!

[Anonymous]

Lol

Maybe he shoulda burned credit one and Fingerhut instead of American Express and discover

[Anonymous]

I agree. Some of the store cards are handy and carry higher limits. It's good to have and keeps my total limit higher and utilization low. Once a year or so, around the holidays I use them. Except for the Kohls and Amazon I use freequently.

I like being part of their club but also plan on getting rid of the othere useless cards like:

Credit One

First National Credit Card

First Savings Credit Card

Avant

I already got rid of a few.

[Anonymous]

It may have been a good stepping stone and I got good experience with those other cards. I just balled out too much.

Lol

[Gollum]

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@Anonymous wrote:

It may have been a good stepping stone and I got good experience with those other cards. I just balled out too much.

Lol

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28 would be a pretty good score in some sports.

[Revelate]

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@Gollum wrote:

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@Anonymous wrote:

It may have been a good stepping stone and I got good experience with those other cards. I just balled out too much.

Lol

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28 would be a pretty good score in some sports.

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Yeah but in some FICO models that's probably a penalty actually, think that started showing up on TU FICO 4 around 25 for me but might have been 30 total accounts on my file.  Doesn't seem to matter on FICO 8 but given that TU FICO 4 is part of the mortgage trifecta it can be a problem.

Think LTL gave it right: if you use a store card and it doesn't have an AF, might as well keep it open.  I also think your list of ones to close is right too, but honestly I would full stop on acquiring anything more.

Those CO's are going to depress your score for a while; wait at least a year before doing anything else, and even then you should re-evaluate where your credit is at that point and then make a plan from there.  Collecting tradelines just to collect tradelines simply isn't necessary and can hurt you both in scoring and in underwriting.

[800FICOGoal]

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@Revelate wrote:

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Collecting tradelines just to collect tradelines simply isn't necessary and can hurt you both in scoring and in underwriting.

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In the rush for scores, I think so many overlook the human underwriter. 

[credit2019]

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@Gollum wrote:

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@Anonymous wrote:

Yes I got some nice cli's recently but I still owe about 8k. I can't get a loan for it or bt.

Frustrating.

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There's no way around this: it all comes down to paying your bills on time. Do that and your credit will eventually improve.

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I hate to say it but this simply isn't true.  I recently opened a bunch of accounts (8 total), and am making all payments on time.  My FAKOs have dropped on average about 100 pts, and don't seem to be coming back as I make payments.  FICO 8 has dropped about 65 points, and FICO 9 is now off about 110 pts from where it was when I started applying and then making on time payments (these FICO 8 & 9 scores are not from the same bureaus, so they aren't 100% comparable).  I suppose over many years it might recover, but at this point I kind of doubt it. Ironically, my scores were all in the high 600's/low 700's when I opened these accounts.  One of my short term (6 month) goals was to finance a Mercedes, and now it appears that I'll likely never be able to finance any make of car, even though I can easily make the payments, without an absurd down payment and high interest.  As it turns out, I probably could have just financed something with my old scores (though likely not a Mercedes).

It appears that the people on this board I was trying to model that managed to build 6 figure credit portfolios in 12-18 months likely had a millionaire in their lives that added them as an AU to some very high limit cards, or have bank connections.  It doesn't seem even remotely possible for a normal person, even with a $100K income like mine, to get anywhere near 6 figures worth of credit.

[xaximus]

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@credit2019 wrote:

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@Gollum wrote:

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@Anonymous wrote:

Yes I got some nice cli's recently but I still owe about 8k. I can't get a loan for it or bt.

Frustrating.

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There's no way around this: it all comes down to paying your bills on time. Do that and your credit will eventually improve.

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I hate to say it but this simply isn't true.  I recently opened a bunch of accounts (8 total), and am making all payments on time.  My FAKOs have dropped on average about 100 pts, and don't seem to be coming back as I make payments.  FICO 8 has dropped about 65 points, and FICO 9 is now off about 110 pts from where it was when I started applying and then making on time payments (these FICO 8 & 9 scores are not from the same bureaus, so they aren't 100% comparable).  I suppose over many years it might recover, but at this point I kind of doubt it. Ironically, my scores were all in the high 600's/low 700's when I opened these accounts.  One of my short term (6 month) goals was to finance a Mercedes, and now it appears that I'll likely never be able to finance any make of car, even though I can easily make the payments, without an absurd down payment and high interest.  As it turns out, I probably could have just financed something with my old scores (though likely not a Mercedes).

It appears that the people on this board I was trying to model that managed to build 6 figure credit portfolios in 12-18 months likely had a millionaire in their lives that added them as an AU to some very high limit cards, or have bank connections.  It doesn't seem even remotely possible for a normal person, even with a $100K income like mine, to get anywhere near 6 figures worth of credit.

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I'm not sure I agree with this. Over a course of 1-2 years, I have jumped from around 25k-30k TCL to around 225k +/-. It all depends on how your profile is and what accounts you have already. I hadn't done much with my account and the few accounts i had were all over 5+ years, some were touching 10 years so my AAoA was right around 4-5 years. I've added probably around 10 cards in the last 12-18 months and my AAoA has dropped down to around 2.5-3 years but as I let my profile age, it's creeping back up. 

[CreditInspired]

+1 @xaximus
The same for me. I started in May 2016 with 1 CC—NFCU Plat, 5yr AAOA, and 640s FICO scores. Btw May 2016 and Dec 2017 I opened 7 accts. In 2018, in addition to a mortgage, I opened 3 more accounts and closed 2. I usually PIF or pay 10x minimum pymt.

@credit2019
I don’t have a 6-figure salary (nowhere close), but I do have a 6-figure CL. And I wish I had a millionaire relative. Also, I have never been an AU on anyone’s cards. Matter-of-the-fact, my brother is an AU on 3 of my cards.

Now, I did get a big drop in scores, but as my cards aged, carrying extremely low UT, and paying on time, the scores are creeping back up.

I just want to say one shoe doesn’t fit all.

[Anonymous]

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@credit2019 wrote:

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I hate to say it but this simply isn't true.  I recently opened a bunch of accounts (8 total), and am making all payments on time.  My FAKOs have dropped on average about 100 pts, and don't seem to be coming back as I make payments.  FICO 8 has dropped about 65 points, and FICO 9 is now off about 110 pts from where it was when I started applying and then making on time payments (these FICO 8 & 9 scores are not from the same bureaus, so they aren't 100% comparable).  I suppose over many years it might recover, but at this point I kind of doubt it. Ironically, my scores were all in the high 600's/low 700's when I opened these accounts. 

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Loads of questions here. Are there baddies somewhere down the line? How much of your available credit do you allow to report each month (percentage)? New to credit? How many cards did you have prior to the 8 new ones?

Eight new accounts in a short span will definitely impact your credit significantly. Yes, it will help pad your utilization, but for many it will basically destroy our AAoA. That's why folks tend to spread these things out. Even if you had two cards that were 10 years old each, with the 8 new accounts, your AAoA is back to 2 years.

The HPs you incurred will likely start to diminish in impact after a few months, so that hit should start getting lighter soon.

Keep in mind though, t's a process. Rome wasn't built in a day. With responsible use, you should start seeing a few points uptick every month or two. Hang in there, it will happpen. In the meantime, there are several very helpful folks here are wizzes at maximizing credit scores. I'm sure at least a few of them can offer ideas that may allow you to see some results in the short term.