Cool thanks about what I expected. Limit is tiny and I can't find the card and don't know my login anyway so lol. Letting this one go.

If I'm reading this correctly, you're not saying you carry a balance, just that your normal charges to this card combined with your low limit keep your utilization high - is that correct?

I have a few recommendations:

1) Keep the amazon card, because it earns 3% on amazon and 2% in restaurants, it has no annual fee, and sometimes amazon does promotions only for card holders that are pretty good.

2) Call chase and ask for a credit limit increase on this card so it's not destroying your utilization.

3) Consider a new rewards card to open along side of this card with bonus categories more in line with your spending and points that you care more about (or flat cashback if you prefer)

http://frequentmiler.boardingarea.co...c-first-class/
http://onemileatatime.boardingarea.c...luding-hawaii/

Ultimately, domestic FC is not really that great of a value. IMO, best domestic FC product is AA's A321 from JFK<->LAX and JFK<->SFO (the BC is great too). The only way to fly that using MR points is to convert to Avios.

I have a smallish balance (~$650) but it's still near the max the card allows (hence the high utilization rate).

I have allocated a good chunk of my upcoming income toward making big payments and having my balance down to $0 within the next few months.

My main question is: Is it better to open a new card elsewhere, transfer the balance and then take on a 0% APR to pay off? My current APR is 18.64 or something like that.

If so, I'd like to pick up an offer from another card that will ultimately also offers other benefits (cash back, rewards, etc.) to add to my "portfolio."

No offense, but I don't suggest getting another credit card if its going to take you a couple months to pay off a $650 balance.

High utilization rates can happen if you use near your limit even if you pay it off every month (depends on when the info is pulled), that's why I asked.

I can't see a balance transfer making any sense here because even with a 19% APR, $650 is not a lot of money and it only adds ~$10/month. If you're going to pay it off in a couple to a few months, a 3% BT offer will cost you almost the same amount. If it will take you longer than 3 months, or if the $10/month is significant to you, then a BT offer is ok, but you might not qualify for one w/ such a high utilization.

I agree with this completely.

Probably right. If I seriously buckled down, I could probably pay it off in one fell swoop of a month.

But with college football and several other trips upcoming, it's probably more realistic that I'm making $150-200/month payments.

Lol. Pay off the card before scheduling trips/gambling. cC debt is the devil man

Then your best best is to seriously buckle down and pay it off in one fell swoop. You know credit card debt is a leech on your finances, especially the higher-interest kind like you have on the Amazon card. While the interest on a small balance like yours may not seem like much, the fact that you're talking about having to carry anything a sure sign that you're not maximizing the advantages of credit & making it work for you. That's really the whole point of having credit. It's not what you can buy with it, it's what you can save with it.

To sort of answer your questions - I wouldn't worry about transferring a balance, not for an amount this small that will be paid off that quickly. If you're in a position to pay off the balance in 1-3 months then just do it and be done with it. In terms of credit advantages, increasing the balance would be preferred and (at least in the long term) having more lines of revolving credit would help your credit score.

But, realistically, when a $650 balance on your only card is something you need to sweat in any way...you're basically living check-to-check now. Lots of people do that, but IMO/IME those are dire straits for anybody older than 16. Not everyone can help it but if you can I would fix that ASAP. More credit isn't advantageous for you right now.

And I know I'm lecturing on it but anybody with a good grasp of finances and credit will tell you the same thing.

Will they really close your cards if you don't use them, and if so, what's the time frame? Also, do they stop reporting to the bureaus if you don't use the card?

How often are these bt check offers given out? I got one for 15 months no interest 2% bt fees. Seems like free money if you can keep getting <2% apr loans with these things.

How does it seem like free money?

1.6% apr is free money to me. its irrelevant to the question though

They're given out fairly frequently, several times a year, but I'm sure it depends on a million other things, one of them being have you taken a transfer offer in the past. Usually they're 3%.

If it was irrelevant to the question then why did you include it in the question.

Thanks for all the great info in this thread, JL et al. I had 2 credit cards 7 to 10 years ago (nothing big) and wound up getting behind and closing them. One with my local credit union, and another with Providian, who was then Washington Mutual, and now appears as Chase on my credit report. Decided that I would prefer to simply not have any cards, as my (now ex) wife was the type always to find excuses to overuse them and wind up carrying balances. (And I was apparently spineless, but that's neither here nor there!) I paid them off in full, but my local bank card was somehow reported as a chargeoff. (They were apparently charging it off the very week I paid the bank in full.) I disputed, and they changed it to "was a charge off - paid in full" which doesn't seem any better or more accurate to me. I have never financed a vehicle or a home; those things were done on the ex's credit.

Fast forward to present day. My vehicle is about ready to be retired (just passed the 200k mile mark.) My goal is to get a new (used) vehicle before the timing belt will be due for replacement again at around 270k miles, and I doubt I would be able to save up enough to buy something that I would want outright, so I figured it was time to look into rehabilitating my credit.

Naturally, I came to 2p2, as I knew there must be some good info somewhere on here. I had no idea about creditkarma or creditsesame, very useful sites! Creditkarma reported my score as a 614 in early April. Better than I expected. (CreditSesame didn't even offer an estimate, I assume because there was so little to go on.) I clicked through on one of the creditkarma recommended offer affiliate links, for the CapitalOne QuicksilverOne Mastercard. Got approved for the minimum ($300.) Yay! I have been using it and paying it off every month, sometimes twice a month to try to generate more cash back hoping to offset the annual fee (It's a bit tough with such a low limit.) I don't know how much difference it makes, but I make a payment to knock the balance down to about $30 so the utilization looks good just before the billing date as that's when it appears to get reported, then pay the rest after billed.

My estimated score has been steadily rising as a result; it was 647 in July. The card from my local credit union fell off my credit report this month, and I got a 15 point boost, so it's now showing as 662. Creditsesame is showing 684. Feeling good, seems I might be able to really start leveraging my credit for some cash back bonii before long! The other card should fall off in December or January, so between that, and continued responsible CC usage, I imagine my score will be looking pretty tasty when it comes time to get that auto loan.

I'd like to go ahead and get another card soon to get some more rewards and credit activity going. I see the Discover it card mentioned here, and I see it on creditkarma accompanied by "691 Average credit score approved for this card † 658 Lowest credit score approved for this card †". Is this the next card I should have my eye on, or is there a card that I would likely qualify for now that would be advantageous to have? If yes, what kind of estimated FICO should I look for before I pull the trigger?

i got the barclay arrival card (no annual fee), i do not see an option to transfer points to say delta, AA, etc. is this not an option with the Barclay Arrival card?

Both chase freedom and discover it are rotating 5% I would get the one that most aligns with your spending. I think chase might be slightly stricter though. Another option that I fin really good is Bank of America cash rewards, 3% gas and 2% grocery all the time with obv 1% on rest. Another thing to consider is these cards give bonuses if you have a checking account with them. So you get 1.10% flat with a boa checking account.

Discover IT is a fine choice, as is the Chase Freedom. At 680ish you should be ok to get either, especially with a phone call for reconsideration if needed. How long have you had your other card? You may want to ask for a credit limit increase if you've had it longer than 6-12 months.

Barclay arrival points are used to offset charges on the card, the points are not transferable. P2, you really need to start reading/researching before applying... this is the second time something like this has happened to you ITT alone.

ya it is a good one for no annual fee. to get that extra 10% though u have to transfer your rewards dollars to that account(checking or savings) so if u accumulate $100 reward dollars(this is the sign up bonus after u knock out required spending) and then transfer it to savings or checking, it actually nets u $110, pretty nice. Although, there are some fees associated with those accounts. I myself have the BoA savings and it is $300 minimum daily balance to waive the monthly fee, there are other ways as well but that is pry easiest. I am sure there are fees with the BoA checking account to.

Welp friends, i just knocked out $3500 in spending for my US Bank Flexperks card, so it's on to the next one. I basically just started this whole CC thing in March of 2014 and I have $161,000 in credit lines, pry higher though, this is what creditkarma suggested. I was at a 778 in Jan 14 and now at 742 according to creditkarma, score provided by transunion . just bought a new house with cash so no mortgage, need a new car soon pry though but im gonna put that off as long as i can. my wife and i have two that run fine but one is pretty old. not really worried about the score going down, it should go back up soon but i dunno, im gonna keep binking credit cards. time to go look now

JL i do research usually, signing up is funner though. im not worried about them not transferring, statement credit is just fine for me as it's really the most efficient. it may not work out to the savings you get with travel but in the end, cutting down on expenses is better than traveling for cheaper than you normally could do it for, if u do not end up traveling that is.

^^^BoA cash rewards card is better than the above two IMO. 3% on gas and 2% at grocery stores permanetly is pretty nice, a lot of times the 5% rotating categories are useless, unless you love going to the movies or spending at Lowes, plus the 10% bonus we talked about above with BoA

noting this for the BoA cash rewards card though: 2% at grocery stores and 3% on gas for the first $1,500 in combined grocery store and gas purchases each quarter.

I signed up for BoA some time ago for some poker related stuff. The kind of account I have is an "eBanking" account, so no fees as long as I don't talk to an actual teller or use phone support, which was fine for my purposes. More details - http://message.bankofamerica.com/Che...king_Model.pdf

I wonder if I could use that account with said BoA Cash Rewards, I buy a lot of gas and groceries. Edit: I don't see why not, looking at the application page on their site.

rush approved for the Gold Delta skymiles, 50k sign up bonus($1k net spend in 3 months), annual fee of $95 waived for the first year. gonna go sign up for the uPromise mastercard now, no annual fee and it has some perks, plus $25 credit upon approval

just got wife on board for Amazon CC, 3% savings at amazon, and $30 Amazon gift card upon approval, instant approval for her.

out cheer grindin

Just an FYI it's a lot easier to get a "soft pull" CLI from Citi now online. Now it has you enter only 3 thing: Income, other income, and rent. Above the form it stated that they would NOT obtain my credit report in their evaluation. Clicked next and it said congratulations, you qualified for an increase of $XXXX instantly, if you would like to request more, you acknowledge we will pull your credit report.

I went back to the form immediately afterwards and it changed, the text at the top reads: "It's easy to find out if you qualify for a credit limit increase. By clicking "Continue" you understand that we will obtain a credit bureau report to evaluate your request. Our credit department will review your request within 24 hours."; and this time they ask for a 4th input, your total requested credit limit.

Basically what this means is you can check the page every 3, 6, whatever months and if you get a form like i described in the first paragraph, no harm in putting your info in and seeing if you can get some easy CL boosts.

What is everyone's thoughts on the Amex Blue card(s)?

blue everyday - $0 annual fee

$100 statement credit after spending 1k in 3 months
3% groceries(up to 6k spending)
2% gas
1% everything else


blue day preferred - $75 fee
$150 credit after spending 1k in 3 mos
6% groceries(up to 6k spending)
3% gas
1% everything else

They're fine, depends how much you spend in the bonus categories. There's also the old Amex Blue Cash, and the new Amex Everyday cards.

I recently signed up for the Blue Everyday. However, I got a $250 bonus for 1k in 3 months. I got the offer in the mail. You can do better than just $100. I don't really use it as I have better options, but it's a good card and sometimes there are Amex promos from retailers.

I got an offer in the mail for a $50 signup bonus for Discover Cashback Checking. All I have to do is fund the account for $25 and there are no fees or min balances. I am an existing Discover Card holder. Does anyone know if this will require a hard pull and has any experience with this Discover checking account? From my research online some say hard pull some say no hard pull.

If its a checking account why would the do a pull?