Newbie question on Util

[Anonymous]

Bank of America cc limit $5,000 & bal $4,200. Citibank cc limit $4,000 & bal $28. My score is suffering because of high util. If I pay down the Bank of America cc allthe way to 1% util before the next statement date will my score automatically go up by 30%? Any util experts ?

[Anonymous]

About 80 points - could be as much as 100+ POINTS.

CL	Bal	UTL	New bal	New UTL
4000	28	1%	28	1%
5000	4200	84%	0	0%
9000	4228	47%	28	0%

[Anonymous]

Thanks Tim. I'm trying to have the biggest positive impact to my fico score in a single month through util. I only have the two major cc's so I'm debating between these two scenarios: 1. Bring down the Bank of America and Citibank each to 1% util before the next statement date. 2.PIF Citibank cc (0% util) and bringing down Bank of America cc to 1% util. This scenario will result in 1/2 of the open cc's with balances. In your expert opinion, which scenario will have greater positive impact on my score? Thanks again.

[Anonymous]

Pay one of them to $0 prior to the statement to ensure a zero gets posted-

Let the other post a small balance-

[Anonymous]

WOW ..my husbands util. are at 72%/75%  (not actually that much money mostly a zero interest deal from home depot and 2 small credit cards) tot $6,200 that I can pay off pretty quick just hadn't realised it made that much difference (and with zero interest on the bulk of it I wan't really hurrying)

Does this mean he could get a REALLY REALLY big jump if I pay it off?

120 points maybe?? Is that for real? let me know and I will pay it off !

    

[haulingthescoreup]

Oh, yeah, absolutely: util is the one area where you have control. If you have the money to pay your accounts down, and if everything will report properly , then YOU have complete control over this major part of your credit scoring!

If you have the cash to do this, pay all of them off except one, and have that one reporting under 10%, or even under 5%, of its credit limit.

Remember, you get HUGE points from FICO for "credit flirtation": show that you have lots of credit, and that you can flash it around every now and then, but that you're the one in control!