is this 0% or 1%???

[Anonymous]

fico-wise, is $8 balance on a $5000 CL 0% or 1%? 

i know, mathematically it's 0.16%. just trying to maximize fico for an app - zero balance all except 1.

 thanks in advance! 

[Anonymous]

---

@Anonymous wrote:

fico-wise, is $8 balance on a $5000 CL 0% or 1%? 

i know, mathematically it's 0.16%. just trying to maximize fico for an app - zero balance all except 1.

 thanks in advance! 

---

It will be < 1% on your credit reports.  So why not bring it to a $50 balance which is 1% of the $5,000?  Is that too much? Are all your others cards reporting a zero balance?

[Anonymous]

yeah, kinda too much. lolz (maximizing reward categories)

as of the moment they are not reporting all zero. 3 of 8 are reporting. less than 2% total U.

i was gonna leave my BBR with its needed balance to report and the rest would be zeroed out before an app. i was hoping that the $8 balance would be considered as rounded to 1% instead of another 0%.

hmmm do i really need a minimum of $50 on that 5k limit card? *5k is my lowest limit card. i thought any amount greater than $0 would be considered/rounded to 1%. i guess i must have misunderstood it.

[Anonymous]

---

@Anonymous wrote:

yeah, kinda too much. lolz (maximizing reward categories)

as of the moment they are not reporting all zero. 3 of 8 are reporting. less than 2% total U.

i was gonna leave my BBR with its needed balance to report and the rest would be zeroed out before an app. i was hoping that the $8 balance would be considered as rounded to 1% instead of another 0%.

hmmm do i really need a minimum of $50 on that 5k limit card? *5k is my lowest limit card. i thought any amount greater than $0 would be considered/rounded to 1%. i guess i must have misunderstood it.

---

If you already have cards reporting balances, then there is no need to leave any balance on this card if you don't have to...

[Anonymous]

---

@Anonymous wrote:

---

@Anonymous wrote:

yeah, kinda too much. lolz (maximizing reward categories)

as of the moment they are not reporting all zero. 3 of 8 are reporting. less than 2% total U.

i was gonna leave my BBR with its needed balance to report and the rest would be zeroed out before an app. i was hoping that the $8 balance would be considered as rounded to 1% instead of another 0%.

hmmm do i really need a minimum of $50 on that 5k limit card? *5k is my lowest limit card. i thought any amount greater than $0 would be considered/rounded to 1%. i guess i must have misunderstood it.

---

If you already have cards reporting balances, then there is no need to leave any balance on this card if you don't have to...

---

thanks but this card is the BoA BBR card where it is needed to report a balance to get the QT bonus. =p

i was trying to see if i zero all my other cards except for this BBR with $8 balance would suffice for maximizing fico.

i guess i might have to charge something more on this BBR after all!?! 

[Thomas_Thumb]

---

@Anonymous wrote:

---

@Anonymous wrote:

---

@Anonymous wrote:

yeah, kinda too much. lolz (maximizing reward categories)

as of the moment they are not reporting all zero. 3 of 8 are reporting. less than 2% total U.

i was gonna leave my BBR with its needed balance to report and the rest would be zeroed out before an app. i was hoping that the $8 balance would be considered as rounded to 1% instead of another 0%.

hmmm do i really need a minimum of $50 on that 5k limit card? *5k is my lowest limit card. i thought any amount greater than $0 would be considered/rounded to 1%. i guess i must have misunderstood it.

---

If you already have cards reporting balances, then there is no need to leave any balance on this card if you don't have to...

---

thanks but this card is the BoA BBR card where it is needed to report a balance to get the QT bonus. =p

i was trying to see if i zero all my other cards except for this BBR with $8 balance would suffice for maximizing fico.

i guess i might have to charge something more on this BBR after all!?! 

---

You are being overly restrictive in your balance reporting. An aggregate utilization of 4% should be no worse points wise (Fico models) compared to an aggregate utilization of 0.5%. Also, given your profile, it is likely reporting a balance on 2 of 8 would not drop your score relative to 1 of 8 - test it.

No need to cramp your style unnecessarily.

Side note 1: VantageScore 3.0 actually scores me higher with utilization in the 3% to 4% range relative to a 1% to 2% range by about 5 points. No change in Fico 08 score. 

Side note 2: Data from Inverse suggests Fico 08 gave him a few points when he dropped aggregate utilization from the 7% to 9% range to the 5% to 6% range. However, no further point gain dropping down to the 2% to 3% range. [Clarification - his file was dirty at the time and clean files may weigh utilization differently]

[Revelate]

There's some minor shifts reported for people at small utilization, to be fair many datapoints aren't controlled and as such it's a little hard to say: "ah ha!"

I've never found any difference at anything >$0, the caveat is some lenders will round something like $2 and lower down to $0 to save money in not generating a statement but sitting at well below 1% personally now ($20/8400) and scores haven't budged vs a higher utilization ($334).  I'll retry the test again next month for giggles and also since like TT I'm curious about Vantage where I've taken a small drop recently, but I would suggest anyone that cares enough about a few points to test it on their individual files as people have found differences and as such YMMV.

[Anonymous]

i see. thanks for all the clarifications! i appreciate it a LOT!  im newb and learning my ways! =)