I am contemplating applying for a home improvement loan (installment/unsecured or home equity). My current score on Experian (the only report for which I orderd a score) was 774.
I currently have a revolving debt utilization of 30 percent, and I have a few accounts with balances. There is no reason for this, other than that I found it useful to use different cards for different purposes, and had the perception that it was better not to have very much on any one card.
My Payment history is flawless, I have a diversified credit use (revolving, installment, mortgage, student loan). So the obvious place where I could improve is to drop the number of accounts with balances and the percentage of revolving credit I have utlized. I could do that within a year simply by following my current plan of to pay off these cards, but - alas - if possible I would prefer to jump the gun and seek the home improvement money now.
Hence, my question: I am wondering if I can improve my score and apparance to lenders if I first take out a personal loan, and use it erase most of the revolving debt.
Would it be a major advantage to restructure this way just before applying for the home improvement loan? Or would having a recent new account give me a "ding" against my score that would cancel out the benefit?
EDIT: Reading this, I realize that I basically just admitted I should wait one year. Maybe I will!
That said, the question is interesting and now I want to know the answer. So I am going to leave this up. 
Your score is very high and it seems like you have a very thick profile. I would assume you would be ok to apply for the loan now if you wanted to. You may see a score increase, how much will depend on how much your utilization changes. With a score above 750 I don't think any lenders would be scared to offer you a loan