How to avoid high util on toy card while rebuilding

[hippychic823]

My Open Sky is "ok". Just "ok". I am thankful for it because it was literally the only card I could probably get at the time and it is better than some other unsecured cards geared at rebuilders/bad credit folks. It's served its purpose nicely, gave me some months of positive revolving history which is all I wanted from it.
Ideally, I would like to close it and get a Discover Secured or a Citi Secured but is it too soon to be closing it? I just opened it in March. Original plan was to keep it open til Feb and close it before next AF comes due. Should I close it then or wait a bit longer? Or, since scores are a little better (low 620's) should I get rid of it now for a more prime level secured card?
I'm thinking if I just hold on to it then maybe by March 2018 my scores will have improved enough for me to get something a bit better.
Ultimately my goal of this entire rebuild is get to an Auto loan at a decent rate (priority #1, my family of 5 no longer fits in my tiny Kia lol. Not wanting anything extravagant. A nice CPO Camry/Accord/Maxima will do just fine) and to get a few decent cash back cards.

[CrankyDave]

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@Anonymous wrote:

It only looks bad if you let a high utilization report to the CRAs.  Most cards report on statement date, some report on the 1st of each month, so learn when yours reports.

One thing I did when my only card was a toy limit was "push" payments from my bank to the credit card -- this way instead of running up high utilization, I actually usually had a NEGATIVE balance (a credit).  So with a $400 credit limit, I might make a charge of say $250 but then push $250 from my bank.  So my credit card would rarely see any utilization.

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That's a great idea. I try to keep my cards zeroed out, but there's been many a time when I got stuck showing a balance because I paid in full at the CC web site a couple days before the closing date, but the payment didn't report until a day or two *after*. I hate that.