My total CL over all my cards is around $100K and I usually maintain a $1K reporting balance on a card that has a $5K CL. Would it help my score if I were to move the $1K balance to a card that has a $25K CL? Or is that not significant enough to matter?
@Anonymalous wrote:Overall utilization is a scoring metric, but so is utilization on each individual card. I'm a young/thin file, and I see a noticeable difference in my score when I have an individual card reporting a 9% balance vs. reporting a 2-3% balance, even if my overall utilization remains largely the same. Since my CLs are all over the place, it's very easy for me to test. I don't believe it will have as much of an effect on someone with a thick/old file, and dirty scorecards may also be very different.
It's also best to use a bankcard as your AZEO card, not a store card. And I've seen people recommend against CU cards, though I forget the reasoning (my Navy Fed CU card works fine for AZEO).
Thanks. I have a fairly thick, old, and dirty file. The reason I carry a balance on the Bob's card (in fact, the only reason I have that card) is because they have some really good 12-month interest-free deals. I'm not really applying for any new credit right now but if I want to in the future, I will switch to a different AZEO card.
Thanks. All my issuers report within a few (2-5) days after the statement date except the Apple Card, which takes 2-3 weeks.
@NYC_Fella wrote:My total CL over all my cards is around $100K and I usually maintain a $1K reporting balance on a card that has a $5K CL. Would it help my score if I were to move the $1K balance to a card that has a $25K CL? Or is that not significant enough to matter?
@NYC_Fella I wanna say that you'd likely see a points boost if that $1000 was being placed on the card with $25K instead of the card with $5K. Currently the $1000 balance is making the $5K card report at 20% utilizaton versus on the $25K card it would be reporting only 4% utilization. However I did see in another comment that you are getting 0% interest on the $5K card's balance. I'm not sure if the few points you might see your score increase would be worth switching the balance from the $5K card to the $25K card, especially if it resulted in you having to start paying interest. Definitely do whatever you feel will be best for you!
Also as another user has mentioned you just have to watch out should you ever start using Chase cards in your AZEO strategy. Since they will report payments off cycle, there is always the risk you could end up with a $0 balance reporting across all cards when you did not want that to happen. Usually they will report your Chase card's balance to the bureaus anytime you make a payment and there is a balance change. If the Chase card was the only card showing a balance and you are doing AZEO, then paying it off would likely leave you showing all cards have $0 balances. Thankfully any points you lose as a result of this can be earned back if you have another card report a balance to the bureaus and there are no other major changes to your credit profile.
Thanks, @Jordan23ww. Fortunately I don't have a Chase card. And I buy small items of furniture from Bob's frequently enough that the interest-fee 12-month period is a nice benefit. Probably not worth switching if I'm only going to gain 5-ish points on my scores.
@NYC_Fella wrote:Thanks. All my issuers report within a few (2-5) days after the statement date except the Apple Card, which takes 2-3 weeks.
@NYC_Fella forgive me if you already know this. I just wanted to be certain you knew that the Apple Card reports your balance in 2-3 weeks of the start of the current month based on whatever it was on the last day of the previous month at 11:59pm. Didn't want to assume that's what you meant and I wouldn't want you to accidentally report a balance thinking that you had a few more weeks to get the balance paid down or off before Apple would inform the credit bureaus.
@simplynoir wrote:I would just watch out for a few banks that have particular reporting times and procedures
For example while Chase report monthly after statements are generated they also report immediately any time you pay off an account to $0. If this card is your AZEO account it will sing you some points since there will be no reporting balances on your reports. Another example is US Bank where whatever your balance is at the I wanna say second to last day of the month gets reported not the statement balance. Just a few banks like this that have weird little quirks you gotta work around if wanting to achieve AZEO
@simplynoir great points! Just to clarify, US Bank reports your balance to the credit bureaus based on what your balance is on the last weekday of the month.