@jafish wrote:
I have been working for the last 6 months on rebuilding my credit after a bankruptcy and foreclosure.
Managing revolving utilization can help but these are going to be bigger problems. Nothing you can do about the BK but wait it out. I'm not sure if there's anything that can be done about the foreclosure. Take a look in the Rebuilding subforum.
@jafish wrote:
When I paid off the last one, my scores dropped again and myFICO stated in an alert that the changes happened because the last card was paid to zero. Why would paying that off cause my score to drop?
That's expected. Standard advice is do not exceed 30%. Lower is generally better as long as you're not allowing all 0 balances to report as there is a hit for that. To eke out every possible point (i.e. when applying for new credit) allow one balance to report at 10% or less. Both overall and individual revolving utilization matter.
@jafish wrote:
Should I keep some balance on my cards from month to month?
You want a balance to report. However, you do not need to carry a balance for scoring purposes.
@jafish wrote:
A couple months or so ago I had a situation where I had to max them all out and let them go past the reporting dates (not late, but not paid off in one month).
That's two different things. If you have a balance on report date then you'll have a balance reporting. Not paying the statement balance in full by its due date is carrying a balance.
@jafish wrote:
How do I find out a card's reporting date?
Most cards report on statement date. You can call your creditors to confirm the report dates. You can also look at your reports. Unless there was a midcycle update the last report date should be the report date.
@jafish wrote:
Should I rotate between the Capital One and Barclay cards each month, or just pick one and use it and pay it off each month?
Doesn't really matter for scores but you may want to ensure that your cards meet their respective creditor's requirements to avoid closure due to minimum activity. Again, confirm with each of your creditors.
@tufa4311 wrote:
You want to keep your UTIL reporting monthly from 1-9% on only one card. Going over 9% can hurt your score and having overall 0% reporting will also hurt your score.
This is not necessary except when applying for credit though there are many that choose to do this all the time. While having higher utilization will have an impact on scores one generally doesn't need to worry about it aside from keeping it under 30%.
