Will my first ever credit card bump my score up?

[Anonymous]

Hi, I'm a 32 year old male with a base pay in the 40's and my current TU score is 587 on CK.  I'm just starting to rebuild my credit after messing up student loans.  I financed my first car loan, I paid cash exclusively before this, six months ago.  Besides that I have zero open accounts on my report.  I'm showing 6 total accounts, 5 of them are the closed student loan accts and of those, 2 are negative marks that went to collection after I defaulted.  The 2 collection accts are paid/closed and falling off my credit history within the next couple months if not sooner (I asked TU to remove them for being old since they're less then 6 months from falling off).  So, my 1 open acct is the car and the payment histoy is 100% on time.  My age of credit history is 6 months and my credit utilization is NA since I have no credit cards on my current credit report.

This week I applied and was accepted for a $300 unsecured credit card. I've applied for a Walmart card online and am waiting for the results in the mail. I'm also going to get a secured Capital One card after I hear back from Walmart.

My question is this. With the AAoA being so low, will I simply have to wait years to establish proof of responsibility or will my new credit cards help me raise my score by 50 points within the year? My hope is to get a Capital One unsecured card once I'm in the 650 range and maybe even a Venture 1 card. I know that gardening my accounts will simply take time, I'm just curious if being new to credit card use will help me get a mediocre score or a quick bump enabling me to get away from secured cards and ones with yearly activation fees.

I know to keep my utilization at 9% or less so should I never go over $27 on the $300 card?  I was planning to use it for gas exclusively but my car can hold about $35 worth.  Should I stop the pump at $25 and then just pay for the rest of the gas with my debit?  If I never go over the 9% utilization, will I still get credit limit increases or will this just slow things down?  Also, I did get my mom to say she would add me as an authorized user on two of her old c.c. accts because CK says that will help change my AAoA since her payments are spotless.  I do not need to apply for any loans, cars or mortgages any time soon as I do already have a brand new car and I'm in a relationship with a woman who owns the house we live in.  With that information, can anyone critique my plan in order to help me see better results?  

Thank you all sincerely for taking the time to read and or offer your help!

[Anonymous]

Yes it will raise your score by having a revolving account. Now it being only a $300 limit and need to have under 9% utilization I would simply put something like Netflix on that card and have auto pay from your checking account pay it every month. the General plan is having 3 credit cards and only have one that reports a balance under 9% and the other 2 cards a $0 balance when bill comes in. Now you can manage this by knowing when is your cut off date for each card before the bill is made out.

[Anonymous]

Also as of right now since you do only have one card make sure that it does report a balance under 10% keep in mind that you would want to avoid all credit cards report a zero balance that will make your score go down.

[Anonymous]

Awsome Afterlife401, I never even thought of Netflix.  I do already pay for the acct so I might as well shift it over to that card and not even use it for gas.  Was thinking if I need to use the Walmart card periodically to keep it active that I would just buy our bottled water there occasionally so its a cheap charge but still something I plan to buy anyway.  

Thanks!!

[Anonymous]

You can use the cards as you wish but just need to know when it's the cut off date. You can call the creditor and ask for that date. That is when you pay it in full on that date so few days after that your bill will be zero and your other card is already being auto payed with a low Netflix bill 😆.

[righthererightnow]

Be careful on your apps... those inquires last two years, (I found out that myself the hard way). Maybe try the 'shopping card trick' for a retail card to add to your mix and just let your credit file build up over time.

[Anonymous]

Thanks, Righthererightnow. I do have a couple hard pulls but so far they are for things I have been approved for. All on TU too, none of equifax or experian. Did some research too and while the pull takes 2 years I was reading that its effect on my credit score goes away after 1 year.

[righthererightnow]

Yep, the score affect goes away but the note on the account will be there for two full years. It shows you're looking for credit and lenders can see that / hold that against you. I got myself into trouble with inquiries and now I'm FOCUSED on not getting anymore until they fall off. Lesson learned.

Have you done a goodwill letter on your loans? I did that recently and they were able to knock a few lates off (rework deferment periods for me). If you haven't tried that yet, that's a good thing to look into.

[Anonymous]

Thanks for the reply, Righthererightnow. I was very tempted to look up a goodwill letter but once I discovered that my two collection accounts are almost 7 years old from the delinquency, I figured I would ask TU and Experian to drop them off my report. Waiting for the results of that but either way I'm only a few months away from them falling off naturally.

[Anonymous]

If your student loans are still on your credit report they will be added into you AAOA for FICO scores Credit Karma does not include them however, so your may have a longer history than you think.