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I maybe overthinking this but I have a question regarding individual vs overall utilization. I am currently taking advantage of some 0% deals and the two cards with balances are reporting as follow:
AMEX: 10.4% utilization
Discover: 12.8% utilization
Overall reported utilization is 4.x% on available credit with 7 additional reporting zero. Current FICO scores are +/- 8, 795. As I budget, would there be any major benefits in bring the individual utilization to under 9%?
Welcome, @Anonymous.
Individual card utilization is determined by the card with the highest utilization. The general scoring wisdom is that the revolving portion of your score is at its best when:
Overall utilization is at 8.9% or below.
Individual card utilization is at 28.9% or below.
There have been some exceptions where people had been dinged before reaching those thresholds. It's possible that some profiles might see an overall utilization ding at about 5%, for instance.
The bottom line is that it looks like you're in great shape. I think the odds are against gaining points for lowering your individual card utilization to 8.9% or below, but you wouldn't know that for sure without testing.
My feeling is that you don't want to inconvenience yourself and that you should continue with your current plan. The reason to bring your numbers down would be if you felt inclined to test so you could see for yourself. But that's going to happen naturally over time anyway.
I am in the process of fulfilling the short term spending requirements of CSR and wanted to budget with good data.
Knowledge is power!