Nymgiants App-o-rama -Round 2 completed 8 months after first AOR. END RESULTS

Last June I completed an apporama where I received 16 new cards with more than 160K in new credit, $365 in card offers cash bonuses, 35K thank you points, 15K Delta miles and $50 cash and 15k continental miles.

I only had 1 negative action taken after doing my apporama and that was juniper reducing one of my cards by a minimal amount $4,000, from $26,000 to 22,000. I cancelled 3 cards that were less than 1 year old, 2 motnhs ago. 2 AMEX (reallocated all but $1,000 each before cancelling) and the GMflex card after the pitifull $600 credit line they gave me.

I am planning to do another round in mid-late Febraury. I will be scoping out for the best 0% and bonus deals as well as getting my fico score up.

This is the link to the prior app-o-rama

June 2006 app-o-rama


I will be adding a breakdown of cards utilization etc.. as well as the updated fico score as I get closer.

I currently have credit lines totaling $441,000

Business cards total CL 50,000 balance owed on 0% cards $24,000 (none reported on creidt reports)

advtanta
AMEX (2 cards)
chase
citi (2 cards)

Persoanl cards: Credit lines total $390,000 Owe $145,000.

capital one
Citi aa
citi elite
AGFCU
AMEX Clear
AMEX Fidelity
AMEX star
boa effectiva-consolidated credit line with bofa closed 1/27
Chase
chase sony
citi attT
citi diamond
citi home
discover
gm
juniper
juniper Orbitz
BOFA
Bofa
penfed visa
Providian
randolf brooks CU
wamu

All of the owed balances are one of the following: 0% offer limited time or 2.99% and 3.99% for life. No card has a utilization over 90%. although 3 of them are in the 80's%


also have a mortgage loan at fixed 4.1% and a car loan at 3.8%

Current scores as of 1/15/07

TU EXP EQ
726 685 699

I also am using true credit for bumpage to get my inquiries down for tu and eq. Have gotten tu down to 1, but Equifax is at 14.

let me know if there is any other useful info you would like me to list before, during, or post.

Update 1/21/07

TU EXP EQ
693 685 699


update 1/27/07
TU EXP EQ
746 685 702

update 1/30/07
TU EXP EQ
746 685 709

2/1/07
TU EXP EQ
746 685 723

My transunion score actually dropped, I had an updated balance show up that put one of my cards over 90%, I will have a new statement before I do the new app-orama and will get that one paid down. I am now in the process of paying down some of my cards. Brought my AMEX down to <70%. That one is a 3.99% for life, I also had 2 0% offers ending this month so I paid them off down to 0. By 2/1, I should have a good indication of what my creidt score will be when I do my next round of apps.

I still need to get my Equifax inquiries down, despite pulling 2 reports a day (TrueCredit and requesting a dispute through Equifax) the 14 inquiries are still there and bumpage has not occured yet. transunion has been fully bumped and now show 0 inquiries.

I am going to try to focus more on business accounts this round so any credit I receive won't show on my credit report as I may be getting to a point where I have too much personal credit that will scare off potential creditors. The only personal cards I will apply for will be those with 0% BT and no or small transaction fee.

? on 2/1 my transunion score dropped 50 points and my Equifax goes up 14 points. Makes no sense as they are all updated. I have no idea why the drop. I'll see if it jsut a fluke in the next few days

Finally an AOR for me. I too am in the same boat from last march-April and and planning a new AOR

I use privacy matters AND creditsecure for daily pulls - if you are going to pull - them pull BIG - double per day (triple on TU)

I need some FWF research on the CITI brand AMEX - i assume you, as myself and many here, have some monster CITI and CHASE cls. I plan to pay those (non-business) off, wait until they show on all reports and then AOR, relocate, bt and chill

Can you move other Citi CL to Citi AMEX to take advantage of the recent offer

You have WAMU - i hear they are stingy with CL - if i could ask how muchdid they give you

i also have some massive BOA and MBNA cl , respectively, i need to do some pay, aor & relocate there also

patch96 said: Finally an AOR for me. I too am in the same boat from last march-April and and planning a new AOR

I use privacy matters AND creditsecure for daily pulls - if you are going to pull - them pull BIG - double per day (triple on TU)

I need some FWF research on the CITI brand AMEX - i assume you, as myself and many here, have some monster CITI and CHASE cls. I plan to pay those (non-business) off, wait until they show on all reports and then AOR, relocate, bt and chill

Can you move other Citi CL to Citi AMEX to take advantage of the recent offer

You have WAMU - i hear they are stingy with CL - if i could ask how muchdid they give you

i also have some massive BOA and MBNA cl , respectively, i need to do some pay, aor & relocate there also

My wamu card has a $10,000 CL. None of my citi cards are AMEX and will probably not go with the citi AMEX. Also, I have been turned down 3x for reallocation of cl's to my newer cards. N o reason given, just that they didn't do it. Even after they told me they would and it would take 3 days, I call back and was told it was declined. Each time the card I was trying to move credit to was a newer card less than 6 months old, The last time I tried was a month ago, so I may try it again in a few weeks

nymgiants said: I also am using true credit for bumpage to get my inquiries down for tu and eq. Have gotten tu down to 1, but equifax is at 14.
Not sure I understand, what does this (and/or privacy matters AND creditsecure as mentioned by patch96) do exactly?

ToHellWithUGA said: nymgiants said: I also am using true credit for bumpage to get my inquiries down for tu and eq. Have gotten tu down to 1, but equifax is at 14.
Not sure I understand, what does this (and/or privacy matters AND creditsecure as mentioned by patch96) do exactly?

Hard inquiries can be bumped off of transunion and equifax after a certain amount of soft inquiries. Not sure the exact amount but I have heard its around 100. Each time you pull your own credit report via a credit monitoring service such as true credit, privacy matters. a soft inquiry is made. Soft inquiries do not affect credit scores. I had 15 hard inquiries on my TU report and have been able to knock it down to 1. equifax, no luck so far but it should strat reducing soon.

this does not work with experian

markcerv said: nymgiants said: Each time you pull your own credit report via a credit monitoring service such as true credit, privacy matters. a soft inquiry is made.

I use truecredit.com, and I have the 3-credit bureau version (for 7.95/mo), and while I am able to view my credit report daily (or even hourly), I continue to get the same report for 1 month at a time.

Right now, when I view it, it says:
Credit Reports
January 9, 2007 (This report is available until Feb 8, 2007.)

So, how do I get it to pull a new one each day?

at truecredit link from this link its 14.95 and you can refresh all every 24 hours. I got mine via a WalMart link several months ago for $11.21 per month

markcerv said: nymgiants said: markcerv said: So, how do I get it to pull a new one each day?

at truecredit link from this link its 14.95 and you can refresh all every 24 hours. I got mine via a WalMart link several months ago for $11.21 per month

Can you tell me what it says when you goto: https://www.truecredit.com/user/transactions.jsp

When I first signed up on 8/31/2005, it said: Order Detail: 3-Bureau Credit Monitoring
Price: 14.95/month
Total: $7.46

but subsequent months have been:
Order Detail: 3-Bureau Credit Monitoring (next line) monthly renewal
Price: 9.95/month
Total: $7.46

Can you please check and let me know what your "Order Detail" is so I can know if we are comparing apples to apples, or apples to oranges?

I get this each month
3-Bureau Credit Monitoring 14.95/month

Total: $11.21

Seperatly I first thought I could only update once a month, for example, from my pull yesterday i get this
January 15, 2007 (This report is available until Feb 14, 2007.)

but there is a link after you click on credit reports,on the right side called update my credit report now.

(I bet I never noticed the link before, because the "right side navigation" doesn't show up until the page is TOTALLY loaded. And I have 48 TransUnion, 45 Experian, and 30 Equifax accounts to report on....so the page loads quite slowly)
It's also on the right side of the Credit Score page. (Yes, they do try to dissuade you since it likely costs them money.)

Fianlly some bumpage on equifax. went down 1 inquiry to 13 total today after my second credit pull. after looking at the dates and timing of the other soft pulls if I continue doing 2 per day. i hope to get eqiofax down to 0 in 2 1/2 weeks. My equifax score actually had a slight rise today, i dought it was from the bumpage as there are still too many on there that one less will raise my score. It is probably from one of my cards reporting a lower balance.


Also decided to combine 2 Bof a cards. one was only 6 months old the other 2 years old. the effectiva card was the newer one but i could not use it for billpay. so i combined that one into my other bofa card so i can use the additional credit for bill pay and it will also slighlty raise my average credit line.

Updated summary

nymgiants said: A Bumpage in the road::::::


Tried to access Equifax via the credit watch gold that I had signed up for. Got an error message. I called Equifax and was told that my report was full and they can not retrieve the report and that there is nothing they can do, so i cancelled the service despite them first trying to tell me I can't. I informed them that they can not provide the full service I signed up for so either cancel the account or provide the service. They cancelled the service.

The odd thing is that I can still pull up my info via TrueCredit and luckily was able to still reduce my hard inquiries. now down to 10. It may take a week longer than expected to clear them all, but am still on target for a late febraury 2nd round app-o-rama.

Equifax score up to 709. Updated summary

After a few more days of access through TrueCredit, I can no longer access. the "service" reps from TrueCredit are not bright. They have no clue and I spent an hour getting the runaround trying the exact same thing 20 times. They didn't make any changes and asked me to try, they just kept saying try log out back in and try again. they then finally said to wait until tomorrow> AARRGGGHHH.

I hope i can still get TrueCredit to finish off bumpage. Otherwise, I would have to get Equifax to trim the report, Which means they usually clear out the soft inquiries. which will suck as I still have 10 hard inquiries on the account I need to bring down.

Combined BOFA effectiva with regular BOFA card. the effectiva card 0% ran out and they changed the fee structure where there was previously no BT fee,. they now charge 4%.

effectiva card only 6 months old, regular bofa card 18 months. was able to move the full line of 13,000 to the bof line of 5000 for a combined 18,000 line. It may eventually hurt my average age of accounts, but it will help my average CL.

Also will try to dispute the closed card as a duplicate card in a week to have in completly removed. THis worked with a couple of chase cards previously.

updated QS

Keeping a close watch on my scores, I have one large balance that hasn't been updated by AMEX yet. If its updated this weekend I will begin the AOR if my score goes up.


I will be applying for cards that due one of 2 things, good 0% offer with no or low BT fee. Or a card with a good signup bonus and reward.

Here are the cards I am planning on applying for. If anyone knows of any other cards that offer 0% BT's with low or no fee, reply on here. My goal is not to accumulate credit lines as I already have over 400K in CL. but to get and utilize BT's/ I have not had much luck finding many Business cads with 0% BT's. will be using cardoffers to get the cash rewards from them as well.

simplicity business
Chase Business Rebate Visa
Citibusiness card
Chase Business Cash Rewards
Starwood Business
FNB
GE money visa
Gmac EQUITY REWARDS(ofa)
Juniper I fly america
Citi drivers edge-card offers
AMEX in-nyc
PNC
RBS
Good Neighbor Credit Card state farm
compass bank
discover gas


Updated Quick SUmmary

What about Discover Business with purchase checks? Do they report on personal report?

I agree with MAP174 regarding FNB. It appears that they don't like AORs and have denied or cancelled just based on the number of inquiries.

I am interested in your results as I am considering a business apporama. I have not done an exclusive biz apporama ever and I think it makes sense for me. Trying to kill a few bt offer balances and knock a few inquiries.

Rob

cardjuggler said: map174 said: I would seriously reconsider FNB Omaha -- many of us have had adverse actions regarding this card.
Green for the link; everyone should recogize the apparent pitfalls of that card. Still, here's an open question: would you be willing to add a "closed by issuer" to your credit report for $500? I'll take it.

(In case I'm being too obscure: roughly $10K BT @ 5% interest, or $10,500 @ 5.25% or higher though probably not for a full 12 months, and ignoring the declining balance, less $75 BT fee, plus $20 sign-up and usage credits.)

good point. if I apply and get the 0% Bt, if they close the account no big deal. Also I have found closed by issuer is not scored negatively unless there was late payments etc. If someone manually looks at the report it may pose some questions, but I have one listed as closed by grantor that FUSA did when they were giving points for BT's and I racked up about $5000 worth of points, they decided to closed my account. It did not ahve an effect on my score

If you decide to go for the FNB Omaha card, make sure you request a BT below 11K -- I wouldn't have minded the closed card if I had gotten the funds first!

Started 2nd go round today. does not look promising. here are the cards I applied for


Personal

FNB
GE money visa
Gmac EQUITY REWARDS(bofa)
Juniper I fly america
Citi drivers edge-card offers
AMEX innyc
PNC
RBS
Good Neighbor Credit Card state farm
discover miles
countrywide

Business
Starwood
simplicity
Chase Business Card with Premier Cash Rebate
Citibusiness card-if drivers edge auto approved yes
Chase Business Cash Rewards
PNC
advanta
AMEX Gold

will update status terms etc.. once more info comes in but out of these 19 cards 2 approved 1 pnc(3000) and AMEX in-nyc(2000), 1 decline discover miles, the rest deferred.

nymgiants said: Tried to access Equifax via the credit watch gold that I had signed up for. Got an error message. I called Equifax and was told that my report was full and they can not retrieve the report and that there is nothing they can do, so i cancelled the service despite them first trying to tell me I can't.It seems my Equifax file was too long and TrueCredit also got locked up, the only way to correct was for Equifax to "trim" the report, which the representative told me was an automated process.Yesterday I called and told the rep that I cannot access the report and told her that 3 of the hard inquiries should not be there. She told me should would take care of it.

Today I was able to pull up the report and the 3 Hard inquiries are still there. However, when i compared this report to the one I was prviously able to pull. more than 100 Soft inquiries were removed. This puts a big dent in the attempt for bumpage, as it is going to take 2-3 months before I can get back to the level where the hard inquiries will be bumped.This is commonly referred to as "choppage" over at CreditBoards and is a well documented problem over there when you use Equifax Credit Watch Gold.

maddybeagle said: Question on the PNC biz card...it didnt look like you can apply for that one with just a SS#...how did you apply?

I also just did an AOR and got all deferrals...as the results start coming in, I havent had any declines...I have 40 or so credit accounts so it must be a lot harder to get instant approval as the numbers increase...My citi PP card called and only giving me 2k limit since I have so many accounts with citi...

I used my ss# for pnc, but that one is deferred so we'll see. I have 24 open showing before aor-2, not counting my biz cards, which may explain the low cl so far

Was able to have all my transunion inquiries bumped and it now shows as 0. Have had no luck with bumpage on Equifax which stands at 11 for the past 2 years, but only 4 from the past year.