@Anonymous wrote:
Personally, I easily spend 3000-4000 a month on my CCs. Sometimes 2000-3000 in one purchase for vacations and such. So for me, it's nice to have a high total limit to keep my overall utilization low, without having to be perfect on when I payoff the cards vs when they report.
Yup, for sure. This thread is focusing on a single card with a high CL, however, and whether that has an advantage, rather than the incontestable convenience of having a big total CL. As you observe, the big total U allows you to charge a lot, make no extra payments, and still have an ultralow utilization.
Some scores and lenders look at your utilization as total balance on CCs vs total CL, but I think some look at your utilization on individual cards as well. I like to try to keep my utilization on each card low, just in case. If I'm asking for a CLI and I always keep my card almost maxed out, seems like I would be less likely to get it, although maybe my logic is flawed. If I ask for a CLI and they say why, I would say that I like to keep my utilization 10% or less and thats hard if I put 3000+ per month on my cards.
My current CLs are, 50k, 40k, 29k, 25k, and 5k on my chase slate that I never use anyways. I currently put most of my spending on my CSR with the 29k limit and just recently spent over 3000 for a vacation. Again, I would prefer to keep this lower to keep my individual card utilization low. I believe all of those limits are including in my total credit utilization, but some of those are recent CLIs so I'll check when I can and report back. Perhaps if you have a bunch that are around 2-5k limit and one that is 50k then I could see them not including that.
If you would, go back earlier in this thread where I express some doubt about the ease with which some people claim to know that certain large CL cards are definitely being included in their total CL. Knowing that is far from easy, unless I am missing something. For example, in your case, your total CL is at least 59k, even if your 50k and 40k limits are not being counted. Suppose your current total reported balance is $5300 right now -- then your CC utilization is still < 8.99% even excluding those two big CLs. Thus, if FICO were excluding them, you wouldn't know, since a util of 8.99% has zero expected penalty, just as much as a util of 2% or 3%. When you say that you'll check, I'd be curious to hear how you plan to check -- I can't think of an easy way for you to do it.
Edit: Missed some replies that clarified some things I was wondering about. It terms of score it seems like I won't be penalized for having high utilization on any single card.
Depends on what you means by "high." If high could mean 25% (say) then no. Many of us (Revelate, TT, Thom Thumb, etc.) are doubtful whether there is an individual penalty even at 49%. But if high could mean 85%, then yes there is certain to be a penalty when the individual U gets high enough.
What about with that speciific company say citi, or chase? If I apply for a CLI or new card with them wouldn't low utilization on their cards be considered a good thing?
I recently saw somebody post in which they referenced some particular issuer's internal memos that clearly implied that they were most likely to grant a CLI when the consumer had a history of frequently being in the 11-49% range (for individual U). (I can't remember the exact range but it was something like that.) That is, high indiv U would be considered a big warning flag (risk) but 1-10% would also be considered bad (in a different way). I am mad at myself for not keeping track of that post! I thought it was interesting. Obviously there are considerations that are likely to be far more important in getting the CLI -- overall credit score (high is good), total U (low is good), derogs (zero is good), etc.
That might have just been that one issuer. But I am pretty sure that your thinking was mistaken -- that you need to go out of your way to make sure that your individual U is very low before asking for a CLI. I would never go out of my way to buy stuff I do not absolutely need in pursuit of a CLI, but if it is easy to give a card an 11+ percent individual U for a few months before you ask for the CLI, it can't hurt.
This, of course, is if I were looking for an Amex SP CLI and wanted to possibly find some value in that 11%+ balance reported on that trade line.
