Hi folks, (and if you're looking for the TL;DR version focused on "what are my chances" - skip to the bolded content below)
Thanks again for everyone here who's been so helpful to me. Just wanted to share a positive story, and hope it helps anyone else in a similar situation figure out how to keep improving. I've been working seriously on improving my credit for about a year - last March I was in the 570s across the board, and now I'm in the 670s at all 3. I still have 4 negative accounts reporting, with EX and EQ showing a couple of them as incorrectly recent (am still working on that.) TU, however, is showing them all correct - with my last baddie being almost 4 years ago now. As of this morning I also had 0 inquiries on my TU.
So, after doing a little research I saw that Barclays seems to only pull TU, and they have a card called "Aspiring Prime" meant for people who want a solid card but who still have some work to do. I went to the pre-qualified link, it said "Congratulations - you're pre-qualified for Aspiring Prime" and after holding my breath for a bit I went for it. I got approved, with an initial limit of $1,000.
It's not a huge limit, but it feels like a big win for me - the first time I've been approved for a new, unsecured line of credit in over 8 years. I know it's going to improve my overall utilization ratio, add another positive TL to my report, and it looks like Barclays is willing to do CLIs after about 6 months - just in time for a big trip I have coming up.
I know "what are my chances" is a popular theme here, so for anyone who wants the nitty-gritty details on what my profile looked like to gauge your chances, here's what I looked like as an applicant:
Applied for: Barclay Rewards MasterCard - Aspiring Prime ($0 annual fee, 24.99% APR, 2 reward pts per dollar on gas/utilities/groceries; 1 pt per $ all else)
TU myFICO Score: 679
Income: 74k
Total accounts: 7
Negative accounts: 4
Types of negative accounts (3 closed, 1 open): 1 unpaid CO for 19k (auto loan/repo) from 5/2010; 1 paid CO for $129 (Utility - Verizon) from 1/2010; 1 student loan with multiple 120+ lates, most recent was 1/2009, transferred/sold with 0 balance reporting; 1 60-day late on other credit card from 10/2007 (this is the open one, will become positive on 7/14)
Types of positive accounts (2 open, 1 closed): 1 auto loan, original balance 14.5k, current balance 11.5k, opened 4/12, never late; 1 student loan, orig bal 6900 current bal 2800, opened 3/2013; 1 student loan, closed as paid satisfactory never late, opened 4/2005 closed 3/2013
Revolving credit: $2500 available, $208 used (8% util)
Inquiries: 0
Result: Instant approval online, $1,000 limit
For what it's worth, they also asked on the application form whether I planned on taking any cash advances from this card (I said no) and also asked how many times in the past 6 months I had taken a cash advance from a card (I said 0).
I get the card in about 7-10 days, and at that time I might call to ask if they'd match the limit Citi is giving me ($2500). I'll post with any meaningful updates from that call.
As always, YMMV, but hope this is somewhat helpful to someone!
Starting score 3/30/13: 570s across the board
Grats on your new Barclays card 
Thanks so much! Really excited to being headed towards "solid citizenship" in the credit community again :-)
Thanks! It really is an awesome feeling - definitely a very happy Friday over here :-)
Congrats. My goal by next march, Barclay and
r discover it.
grats!
im thinking that with your profile and income, that if you have a decent reason for that auto CO it's probably worth a call to the backdoor number to recon for a higher limit. just my two cents 
>
Thanks so much, all! Really appreciate the kind words and continue to feel grateful for finding these forums :-)
buildafico - thanks for the encouragement, I was thinking about doing that (I do have a reason for the auto co, I guess it'll be barclay's call about whether it's a good reason ;-)
On that note, though, since I saw you have the card too - do you just call regular customer service to request an initial higher limit? Or would you recommend a more specific number? Feel free to PM me if you think there's a specific number I should call - and thanks again!
pm sent! in case anyone else happens to be reading this and wondering what number, it is actually widely available on this site in the recon numbers post.
need your feedback on this scenario!!! i recently applied for barclays NFL in error ( iwanted the mastercard cash rewards ) but i guess i didnt have my glasses that day so i got approved instantly fro $1000, waited on the card, then a week later i applied for Discover andi got partial denial, then a window popped up asking if i wanted to add a co-signer i said no, a week later ( i know i went crazy with all these applications but i was very very curious ) i applied with cap 1 which i had asecured card with them for more than 2 years, got approved for $300, a joke !!! i picked up the phone and spoke to one of their reps, adn they were determined that there's nothing they can do to increase the CL regardless of the relationship that i have with them, THEY PISSED ME OFF REALLY !!!! i got the card that i didn't activate and i wont as im not going to use it, BTW this was a ( Quiksilver ). couple of weeks later i applied for Belk card, instant approval for 500, good since that's one of my favorite stores, then next day after this i applied for Citi dividend and i got declined of course, and im sure they looked at my inquiries. im not going to apply for anything anymore until i get the first premier fraud off my CR, as those pple and since 2009 were reporting ( something that i have never used or agreed to ) to all CB as a charged off account. My actual EQ fico is 620. So after all of this, and after reading all the reviews about Barclays pulling credit reports, and closing accounts due to many inquiries after their approval, do you think that this might be my case even if im a good customer paying in full and on time ? and btw they converted my NFL to the Mastercard cash rewards after i explained what i wanted to apply for on day 1. any advice will appreciated !
Thanks