@baller4life wrote:Hello and welcome to the forums. 😊 My advice would be to not app for any more store cards. Continue lowering your utilization and once your membership is approved with NFCU app one of their cards. I was also in the 590's when I was approved for my first card with them. Once you get your score to 680+ then you can app a card with Penfed.
Yes there are a couple NFCU data threads. The original thread is below:
http://ficoforums.myfico.com/t5/Credit-Card-Applications/Official-NFCU-CLI-Guide/td-p/2101185
The 2nd thread is below:
Baller, thank you so much for taking a look at this!!! I really appreciate your advice 
You rock girl!
@Anonymous wrote:Hi Everyone,
I am new to MyFico and very, very excited to be here. I have lurked a long time and have read some amazing and inspring stories! There is so much out there and everyone has a different credit history. I want to go in the garden and get my score up as high as possible in the next 6 months. I'm in the process of joinng the Navy League so I can join NFCU. Once I join with them I want to get my scores up and age my accounts so I can hopefully get a great offer on a CC and CLOC! I also want to get to a point where I can get better offers from creditors and get my limitis in the 5 digits.
I would like to know what you would do to maximize your score in the next 6 months if you were in my shoes. I have no problem closing any of my accounts if it will help. For example; the ones with 0 balance really have nothing I am interested in. I kind of wish I never opened them. I'll keep them if needed though. I'm sure I can find something from each. I know my Utilization is high and am ready to pay it down. Please let me know if there is any other information I am missing. Thanks in advance for looking!
Annual Income: 120K
Current Fico 8 as of 11/26/16 via MyFico.com
EQ 594
TU 633
EX 639
100% on time payment history for all open credit. One closed credit card paid in full and closed at the request of the customer.
Installment Accounts:
EQ: 0
TU: 1- Car Loan 13,000
EX: 4- Car Loan 13, 000 and 3 small loans from Affirm totaling 2,500
Collections:
EQ: 1-$166 unpaid and opened on 05/2014
TU: 0
EX: 1-$166 unpaid and opened on 05/2014
Public Records:
EQ: 1- 2009 Paid/Released Tax Lien (Open dispute with EQ to remove)
TU: 0
EX: 0
Credit Cards:
Yes, I did the SCT….a lot!
Card Owed Limit Opened
Ulta 0 300 11/2016
Amazon 400 800 11/2016
Capital One Sec 190 200 07/2015
Capital One Quick 720 750 03/2016
Lane Bryant 438 500 12/2014 (will not let me do SP increases online or Robolady)
Barclay Rewards MC 440 500 08/2016
Indigo 295 300 08/2016
Roaman's 85 250 08/2016
Full Beauty 220 250 08/2016
Victorias Secret 200 350 08/2016
New York & C0 0 250 08/2016
Boscov's 0 250 09/2016
JD Williams 0 250 08/2016
Simply Be 0 250 08/2016
Inquiries
EQ: 12
TU: 10
EX: 6
NOVEMBER 2016
Comenitycapital/Ulta
November 20, 2016
At&T Services, Inc.
November 11, 2016
Syncb/Walmart Plcc
November 22, 2016
Syncb/Amazon
November 22, 2016
AUGUST 2016
Comenitycapital/Bosc
August 25, 2016
Discover Bank
August 25, 2016
Comenitycapital/Over
August 25, 2016
Syncb/Jc Penney Plcc
August 25, 2016
Syncb/Walmart Plcc
August 25, 2016
Barclays Bank Delaware
August 24, 2016
Chase Card
August 25, 2016
Bk Of Amer
August 25, 2016
JULY 2016
Capital One
July 04, 2016
Mab&T Retail
July 04, 2016
MAY 2016
Td Bank Usa/Target C
May 01, 2016
APRIL 2016
-
Barclays Bank Delaware
April 12, 2016
Chase Card
April 30, 2016
Syncb
April 30, 2016
Cashcall Inc
April 10, 2016
MARCH 2016
Capital One Bank Usa
March 04, 2016
Capital One Bank Usa Na
March 04, 2016
Cap One Na
March 04, 2016
FEBRUARY 2016
Sterling
February 13, 2016
Syncb
February 11, 2016
Cbcinn/Extend Credt.Comc
February 11, 2016
JANUARY 2016
Comenity Bank/Avenue
January 15, 2016
DECEMBER 2015
Ccb/Ppc
December 15, 2015
Sears/Cbna
December 13, 2015
My advice would be:
1. Do not open any new accounts and do not close any accounts.
2. Pay your installment loans down to 9% or more of their original amounts.
3. Have most of your credit cards report a zero balance. Have the others report 9% or less.
4. Write verification letters to the credit bureaus to try and get rid of the negatives.
5. Don't use your store cards any more.
After 6 months you should see improvement in your scores.
At that point you should consider slowly
closing your store card accounts, lowest limit accounts first. And for every 2 or 3 store accounts closed,
slowly adding regular credit cards.
@Anonymous wrote:Trying to get your derogs removed is a good idea. There are people here who have a lot of experience with that (e.g. Brutal Body Shots) who seem very generous with their time in walking newcomers through that process: verification letters, good will letters, pay-for-delete negotiations, etc.
SouthJamaica's idea about paying your total installment debt down to < 9% of the original amount while still keeping the loan open is great -- but you may find that expensive to tackle right away, given the size of your car loan. Therefore I would suggest shelving that idea until all of your CC debt is paid off.
Regarding your CC debt, here is the way I would prioritize the task of paying it all off:
(1) Make sure that every card is paid down to under 49% of its credit limit
(2) Pay off entire cards so that you create more cards with $0 balances
(3) Pay off your last piece of CC debt
It's fine to keep using your cards while you are paying them down, but only if it does not prevent you from those three sub-tasks. #1 is extremely important. If you think you might be placing a charge on a card, you may need to plan to lower the card to 40% or 30% so that you are certain it will be reporting at < 49%.
At the end of the process you'll want to be using a couple cards a month with most cards reporting $0. You'll also want to take all your cards out of hibernation and use them for something small once every six months, except the $0 junk cards -- if the issuer closes them, fine. (Slight caveat: if you have never used the card even once AND you have something you really need that you could use the card for, then I'd use the card once. But only if you can REALLY find something you need. Remember that you want your money going toward paying off your debt, not creating more debt.)
And as people have told you, stop opening new credit cards for a long time.
Finally, because you have no open installment loans with EQ and because it is by far your lowest score, we can suggest a painless way to increase that score by 25 points or so, via the Share Secure Loan Technique. I would only consider the SSL technique after your CC debt is mostly paid off. You will need about $510 of spare cash to execute the technique, and you'll get most of that back in a couple months.
Hello CreditGuyInDixie,
Thank you for taking the time to look at my credit story. I truly appreciate it! Thank you for the advice and the information about the SSLT. I've never heard of this before. I'm off to investigate!
Thanks again