Raising Credit scores - am I getting the basics?

[Anonymous]

Coming off divorce last year to an ex who was constantly defeating my efforts to improve our financial position.   Turned up almost $14k on credit cards in her name only that I did not know about during course of divorce.  All good now though.  During divorce I went through and made sure ex is off all of my cards as well as cleaned up any detrimental items on my report.  Currently Experian is reporting my score as 750. 

I have about 25% utilization over 5 cards - Amex Clear, Discover, US Bank Visa, Credit Union Visa, Macys store card.  Most of the balance is on the Credit Union Visa which I am paying down aggressively.  I am trying to understand what else I can do to boost my score into upper 700s. Some of the ideas  I have seen are:

-- Open an additional Amex card - I assume this is a different one than what I have now with the Amex Clear

-- Request a credit line increase from existing cards

-- Open a new "premium" card - I am not sure what is defined as premium cards

-- Reduce utilization to between 1% and 9% and limit it to just one card - I assume this is accomplished through a combination of paying down existing debt as well as increasing credit lines.

I am very new to this whole process but wiling to learn to drive put myself into that super premium range.

thanks,.

[Anonymous]

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@Anonymous wrote:

Coming off divorce last year to an ex who was constantly defeating my efforts to improve our financial position.   Turned up almost $14k on credit cards in her name only that I did not know about during course of divorce.  All good now though.  During divorce I went through and made sure ex is off all of my cards as well as cleaned up any detrimental items on my report.  Currently Experian is reporting my score as 750. 

I have about 25% utilization over 5 cards - Amex Clear, Discover, US Bank Visa, Credit Union Visa, Macys store card.  Most of the balance is on the Credit Union Visa which I am paying down aggressively.  I am trying to understand what else I can do to boost my score into upper 700s. Some of the ideas  I have seen are:

-- Open an additional Amex card - I assume this is a different one than what I have now with the Amex Clear

-- Request a credit line increase from existing cards

-- Open a new "premium" card - I am not sure what is defined as premium cards

-- Reduce utilization to between 1% and 9% and limit it to just one card - I assume this is accomplished through a combination of paying down existing debt as well as increasing credit lines.

I am very new to this whole process but wiling to learn to drive put myself into that super premium range.

thanks,.

---

Welcome to the forums.

Assuming that there are no 'baddies' on your file, then the single biggest way to raise your score is to lower your overall utilization.  Yes, between 1-9% is typically given as an ideal range, but as low as possible is the better answer because you will see better scores at 2% than you do at 4%.  Hers where getting credit limit increases can help y raising your total overall credit.  However, if the credit card company will only consider a CLI by doing a hard pull then any raise in your credit limit could be offset by the inquiry.

Opening another AMEX card will not raise your score.  In fact it will could very well lower due to the inquiry and effect the average age of your credit file.

You have 'premium' cards now and opening another one could lower score due to the same reasons as above.

As mentioned, focus on your utilization as at 25% it definitely is holding your scores down.  Hope this helps and good luck.

[bdhu2001]

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@Anonymous wrote:

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@Anonymous wrote:

Coming off divorce last year to an ex who was constantly defeating my efforts to improve our financial position.   Turned up almost $14k on credit cards in her name only that I did not know about during course of divorce.  All good now though.  During divorce I went through and made sure ex is off all of my cards as well as cleaned up any detrimental items on my report.  Currently Experian is reporting my score as 750. 

I have about 25% utilization over 5 cards - Amex Clear, Discover, US Bank Visa, Credit Union Visa, Macys store card.  Most of the balance is on the Credit Union Visa which I am paying down aggressively.  I am trying to understand what else I can do to boost my score into upper 700s. Some of the ideas  I have seen are:

-- Open an additional Amex card - I assume this is a different one than what I have now with the Amex Clear

-- Request a credit line increase from existing cards

-- Open a new "premium" card - I am not sure what is defined as premium cards

-- Reduce utilization to between 1% and 9% and limit it to just one card - I assume this is accomplished through a combination of paying down existing debt as well as increasing credit lines.

I am very new to this whole process but wiling to learn to drive put myself into that super premium range.

thanks,.

---

Welcome to the forums.

Assuming that there are no 'baddies' on your file, then the single biggest way to raise your score is to lower your overall utilization.  Yes, between 1-9% is typically given as an ideal range, but as low as possible is the better answer because you will see better scores at 2% than you do at 4%.  Hers where getting credit limit increases can help y raising your total overall credit.  However, if the credit card company will only consider a CLI by doing a hard pull then any raise in your credit limit could be offset by the inquiry.

Opening another AMEX card will not raise your score.  In fact it will could very well lower due to the inquiry and effect the average age of your credit file.

You have 'premium' cards now and opening another one could lower score due to the same reasons as above.

As mentioned, focus on your utilization as at 25% it definitely is holding your scores down.  Hope this helps and good luck.

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Part of the reason people have suggested another AmEX is because AmEX back dates the new card.  Thus, the new AmEX will show a beginning date that matches your current AmEX card, thereby, boosting your AAoA.  

In addition, I understand that AmEX will allow you 3xs your CL in 90 days.  I've seen plenty of people mention it on the forum, but it hasn't worked for me (the 3x CLI).

[Anonymous]

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@bdhu2001 wrote:

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@Anonymous wrote:

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@Anonymous wrote:

Coming off divorce last year to an ex who was constantly defeating my efforts to improve our financial position.   Turned up almost $14k on credit cards in her name only that I did not know about during course of divorce.  All good now though.  During divorce I went through and made sure ex is off all of my cards as well as cleaned up any detrimental items on my report.  Currently Experian is reporting my score as 750. 

I have about 25% utilization over 5 cards - Amex Clear, Discover, US Bank Visa, Credit Union Visa, Macys store card.  Most of the balance is on the Credit Union Visa which I am paying down aggressively.  I am trying to understand what else I can do to boost my score into upper 700s. Some of the ideas  I have seen are:

-- Open an additional Amex card - I assume this is a different one than what I have now with the Amex Clear

-- Request a credit line increase from existing cards

-- Open a new "premium" card - I am not sure what is defined as premium cards

-- Reduce utilization to between 1% and 9% and limit it to just one card - I assume this is accomplished through a combination of paying down existing debt as well as increasing credit lines.

I am very new to this whole process but wiling to learn to drive put myself into that super premium range.

thanks,.

---

Welcome to the forums.

Assuming that there are no 'baddies' on your file, then the single biggest way to raise your score is to lower your overall utilization.  Yes, between 1-9% is typically given as an ideal range, but as low as possible is the better answer because you will see better scores at 2% than you do at 4%.  Hers where getting credit limit increases can help y raising your total overall credit.  However, if the credit card company will only consider a CLI by doing a hard pull then any raise in your credit limit could be offset by the inquiry.

Opening another AMEX card will not raise your score.  In fact it will could very well lower due to the inquiry and effect the average age of your credit file.

You have 'premium' cards now and opening another one could lower score due to the same reasons as above.

As mentioned, focus on your utilization as at 25% it definitely is holding your scores down.  Hope this helps and good luck.

---

Part of the reason people have suggested another AmEX is because AmEX back dates the new card.  Thus, the new AmEX will show a beginning date that matches your current AmEX card, thereby, boosting your AAoA.  

In addition, I understand that AmEX will allow you 3xs your CL in 90 days.  I've seen plenty of people mention it on the forum, but it hasn't worked for me (the 3x CLI).

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Good point about the backdating.  It's importance would only be known if we had his current  AAoA.  

[Anonymous]

No baddies on the report.  Getting dinged a bit because I had to close a joint Discover with 20 years on it and reopen it new last year.  Report is also reporting like fourteen revolving accounts of which like 9 are joint accounts closed during divorce.

Do i manually callculate the AAOA or is it available somewhere.?  Account open dates as follows:

Macys 2/2011

Amex 8/2007 raised CLI without me asking in Feb due to my paying it down 

Discover 4/2014

US Bank 6/2014

CU Visa 2/1989 - just noticed still incorrectly showing as a joint account

[gdale6]

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@Anonymous wrote:

No baddies on the report.  Getting dinged a bit because I had to close a joint Discover with 20 years on it and reopen it new last year.  Report is also reporting like fourteen revolving accounts of which like 9 are joint accounts closed during divorce.

Do i manually callculate the AAOA or is it available somewhere.?  Account open dates as follows:

Macys 2/2011

Amex 8/2007 raised CLI without me asking in Feb due to my paying it down 

Discover 4/2014

US Bank 6/2014

CU Visa 2/1989 - just noticed still incorrectly showing as a joint account

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You will find the calculator link in this thread    http://ficoforums.myfico.com/t5/General-Credit-Topics/AAoA-Calculator-Link/td-p/3792733

[Anonymous]

AAoA is 7.82 years average over 5 accounts

Basically right at the same as the AMEX age, so adding another Amex would not help.  Kind of stinks that I lost the 20 year Discover from the average because of the joint account thing.

[Anonymous]

Does Discover have a way to request a credit line increase online?

*** Nevermind I found it.

[Anonymous]

Holy cow.  Awesome advice.

I just got a $500 increase on Discover and a $1900 increase on Amex.

[Anonymous]

Add on question - is there a recommend time frame between asking for credit increases on various cards so that it doesnt generate too many hard pulls at a single time?