@Paj315 wrote:
I guess I say “game” because it’s all about making the right moves. I’m Def not interested in playing around with my finances!! This is def serious.
I left the Facebook group right after he pulled out the whole “I’m a certified FICO coach” line. Yes you’re right the group was filled with people just trying to get their bills deleted off their reports, and the group was moderated by a credit repair company. 🙄
Thanks for confirming the info for me!! I love this place, it’s been so helpful for me and my hubs. His EQ score is currently up from 619 to 749, from all the advice I’ve read about on here!!!
It never ceases to amaze me when one feels the need to throw his/her title around to seem smarter than everyone else in the room. Obviously he's not a certified FICO coach. 
@Anonymous wrote:The "certified FICO coach" might be a "certified glue sniffer" also.
This is my Laugh Out Loud moment for the day. Thank you for this.
@CreditSage wrote:I have some high utilization on three cards right now and want to bring them down. I do not think I will be able to bring them to <8.9% or <30% just yet. I did not gather this from your response so I wanted to double check.. are there any other thresholds which will produce a gain? Thanks in advance.
Two of the cards I can probably take care of. The third has a $5,300 limit with $5,100 utilization. What is the best bang for the buck I can get (i.e. least payment highest return)? Thanks
To get a clear answer, it would be best if you could list out all your revolving credit cards; for each card the limit, amount owed currently, and APR.
There is some benefit to getting out of the highest utilization, in this case 96%, to find a way to bring that down. Getting all cards lower is always best, but the highest utilization card will be the sore thumb in your score, so keeping that "worst case" item coming down is what is going to have the most effect on your scores.
Overall utilization is also important to keep an eye on, thus the request to know all your limits, to see what total utilization is. Bringing that down is another way to improve scores.
@CreditSage wrote:I have some high utilization on three cards right now and want to bring them down. I do not think I will be able to bring them to <8.9% or <30% just yet. I did not gather this from your response so I wanted to double check.. are there any other thresholds which will produce a gain? Thanks in advance.
Two of the cards I can probably take care of. The third has a $5,300 limit with $5,100 utilization. What is the best bang for the buck I can get (i.e. least payment highest return)? Thanks
48% is a good one.
@CreditSage wrote:Thanks. Where are you getting the 48% percent number from? Also, is there a higher bracket - I might want to pay down less.
From things I've read in this forum. And yes there are a couple of higher thresholds.
But you're not going to get really good points until you're below 30%.
@Anonymous wrote:
@CreditSage wrote:
Bank of America $500/$17,000 - 3%
Capital One $1,278/$1,300 - 98%
Capital One $679/$700 - 97%
NFCU Amex $5,205/$5,300 - 98%
As an intial goal, I'd set out to pay the 3 maxed out utilization cards down to roughly 68%. Doing so would require around $2200, as you'd need to pay about $400 to the first card, $200 to the second and $1600 to the third.
It also looks like you're at around 32% overall utilization now. Bringing those 3 cards down to 68% utilization individually would allow you to cross the 28.9% threshold on aggregate utilization and then some, as you'd end around 23% utilization after the proposed paydown.
This. Paying down is best. OP is really completely maxed out on those three cards. There is barely room for an interest charge.
A suggestion might be to try to BT some over to the Bank of America card, but that risks spooking BofA, and getting a CLD from $17k to something less. Two of the balance chased accounts I had were BofA, and they worked the limits down for a few years until they got more comfortable with my balances.