@Anonymous wrote:
@DollyLama wrote:
How old is the Walmart card that you were recently added as authorized user? If it is younger than your oldest card, it will have dropped your average age of accounts.
With your oldest account being the same age as the oldest AU account, no real scoring benefit unless it is solely to reduce your utilization, otherwise IMO, I would remove myself from being an AU.
Do you also know if both, or one of the AU accounts are reporting a balance?
Your utilization back in May is unknown at this time, and even though you are not in "danger" zone threshold, your utilization could have been under the threshold of 28.9 on an individual card then vs. tad over that threshold on the Cash Wise now, and possibly less cards reporting a balance.
So you're saying that more than 1 AU account doesn't help? Let's assume someone has an AAoA of just over a year and oldest account is 6 years 4 months. Say that is an AU and next oldest is their own card that is 3 years 8 months. They go on an app spree(6 cards) which brings their age down to 15 months. Total of 8 account is 120 months. If they get added as an AU of a card that is also 3 years 6 months, then wouldn't they be an average age of 18 months? Which really isn't a big deal other than hitting AAoA 3 months earlier. Or do you only get the benefit if the cards are older then your oldest? Or only benefit from 1 AU account?
Also in your post just above you state getting a loan that can be paid down and let sit at that balance for 4-5 years I believe. You only get that benefit as long as you don't have any other open loans, correct? If you do this and then get an auto loan in year 2, then the only benefit from that point on would be keeping it on your history for a longer period as your auto loan would most likely be above that threshold for the remainder of time that loan is open or am I wrong on that?
" Let's assume someone has an AAoA of just over a year and oldest account is 6 years 4 months. Say that is an AU and next oldest is their own card that is 3 years 8 months. They go on an app spree(6 cards) which brings their age down to 15 months. Total of 8 account is 120 months."
You can not have an oldest of 6 years 4 months, add cards and go higher to 10 years( 120 months). It is not a cumlative age of the cards. It's as if you have 3 children, ages 6, 4 and 1 year, the average age is 3.7 rounded up, not 11 years. You take the number of open accounts and divide by the cumlative age then to get the average age.
Most here, add an AU for purposes of helping another with starting credit (you have already established a good bank relationship with Chase, AMEX and WF. Or they add to reduce utilization (you already have excellent utilization without them). Or just a longer credit history, I'd keep the Lowes since it's your oldest, however there may be a time that underwriting, for mortgage might be needed and they require you to remove yourself, to reflect your personal credit. The Sears is most likely going to close with the impending BK they are filing, the Walmart is really too young and did affect your AAoA, along with any app spree in last 12 months in particular.
The loan if add will boost your score for the credit mix, but the optimal for score is less than 8.9% reason many only borrow around $500 to $1000 and turn around and pay it down $440 or $860 dollars. If an auto loan is obtain in future, then you can pay off this small loan as the new loan will take its place for credit mix, but you may be dinged a smidge as most people do not instantly nor can afford to pay it down to less than 8.9%, but I would wait till after the car loan goes through not before, for the best optimal "score" at that time when applying.
