A few updates:

Credit Scores:
- EQ score dropped 36 points after Juniper and Discover BT balances showed up. Interesting that those balances appeared to only drop TU score 7 points...big difference.
- Juniper, Sony and Discover BT balances showing up in all three reports now. PNC, Citi Prof and ATT remain to be seen.

Rewards:
- 10k SPG points for business card posted on 4/23
- 30k TY points (15k each) for Citi Biz and Citi Biz PP reported on 4/23...coincided with statement close
- 20k AA miles for AA Citi Biz posted on 4/23
- $15 Juniper credit received at statement close...also received subscription to Flying magazine
- $100 Sony credit received on 4/24

BTs:
- BoA biz BT transfer ($12k) to Citi Prof requested on 4/10 finally posted on 4/23. Ater originally being told it would take 3-6 business days, I was told BoA had to verify some information before they could BT such a large amount and that resulted in the delay.
- Deposited $16,720 ATT BT check to checking. Requested BT check via web site on 4/13 and received on 4/23.
(Side note on BT check deposits...I commented on one experience a few weeks back, but thought I'd elaborate now that I have some more deposits under my belt: My experience with BoA checking is that all BT check deposits deposited via ATM (5 total, each one deposited separately), regardless of the amount, show up in my balance the next day. While the two deposits I did via a teller were put on hold. After looking at my hold deposit slip and talking to the local bank rep, it appears that it's standard practice to hold checks, particularly CC BT checks. However, ATMs apparently don't follow this practice.)
- So far I've BT'd $120,690, with $95,040 sitting in HYSAs. The main BT left to do is from Citi Biz PP...planning on using that to lower the utilization on the ATT, Discover and PNC cards once their payments are due and put the remaining amount into a HYSA.

A few updates:
- I deposited another $40k into Fidelity on 4/23 to get the additional 10k AA miles bonus and I noticed they posted on 4/27. So, I forfeited some interest on the $50k balance for a few weeks, but gained the $100 and 25k AA miles signup bonuses.

- Now I plan on moving the $50k from Fidelity, along with the majority of my BT money, to a FNBO Direct 6% account.

- Starwood AMEX and AMEX Gold cards showed up in EXP and the AMEX Gold account moved under Revolving Accounts.

- PNC BT balance showed up in EXP...but my EXP score didn't change.

BT'd $22,250 from PNC, Discover and BoA Biz cards to Citi PP Biz card. As mentioned before, I'm paying down the personal cards to get below 50% on each. BT'd from BoA Biz card because I still have 0% BT checks from BoA and plan on dipping into that well again.

As of today, I've BT'd just under $143,000. I still have ~$6,000 remaining that I can pull out and still keep each of the personal cards at under 50% utilization, and under 30% utilization overall.

The Citi Professional BT balance showed up on EQ and TU. My EQ score is the last remaining one over 700 (just barely at 702). The last BT balance that remains to be seen is from the ATT card.

The last of my BT balances showed up today in TU. I guess that means my scores have bottomed out. I suppose they could've dropped even more, but I paid a few balances down (as mentioned above) in parallel to other balances showing up.

Bottomed out scores, including total drop in score:
EQ - 702 (57 pts)
EX - 668 (103 pts)
TU - 693 (79 pts)
The caveat to these drops is that I switched from Citi to TrueCredit the day after my AOR. Seeing as how my EX score dropped 52 points in one day before any new cards showed up, and with only two inquiries, I know that's not an accurate reflection of the CC (inquiry) impact to the EX score (i.e. had as much or more to do with the different monitoring service).

Now, once I start paying some of the other CC balances down to reach a lower utilization, it'll be interesting to see if my scores begin to jump up (even before inquiries start to fall off). If not, I may have to take some more of the BT money available to me.

markkundinger said:I forget, are you planning on making large payments on these cards to drop below certain balance thresholds? Because if you just make minimum payments, your utilization won't substantially change until you start paying off lines entirely.

Personally, I just rode out the low scores, and let Chase go ahead and shave credit from me.

Yeah, my (somewhat conservative) plan is to use the BT money available from the business cards to pay down the personal balances to below 49%. After that, I plan on making the minimum payments. The way I figured it, I won't have any personal cards over 49% and my overall utilization will be under 30%...and, I'll still have between $95k-100k in HYSAs. Like I said, if my scores don't increase a good bit after a couple months, I may change my thinking.

It's been a while since I provided an update...I've been out of town and there hasn't been a whole lot of activity. But, there are a few updates.

- After emailing somone at cardoffers.com, I found out that they only had record for 3 of my 5 CC applications. To resolve the remaining two (including the $75 Starwood Biz AMEX), I had to send them proof, including copies of the actual cards, screen shots of the signup pages and copies of the first statements...glad I had those screenshots. After sending in the proof, I was told that I would receive checks for all of the cards. I got the second check today and expect the final check for the remaining amount next month.

- I also received the 7,500 mypoints from the E-LOAN offer.

- As shown in the OP, all of my TU inquiries were bumped from my credit reports and now the EQ inquiries are starting to go. Since I had 20 EQ inquiries, I'll gladly take those bumps. My TU and EQ scores have increased quite a bit.

A few updates:
- I got the final cardoffers.com check last week. So, I received the entire $195 I was expecting. Woohoo.

- I'm continuing to pull my credit reports via TrueCredit and the EQ inquiries continue to disappear...down from 20 to 7 now. It's interesting that some of the older inquiries are being skipped in terms of those being bumped...i.e. there are still two inquiries from 2005 and 2006 that remain while inquiries from my AOR in March are falling off.

- My EQ FAKO score is now higher than before I began my AOR (as shown in the OP)...and I still have a few more bumps that should raise it.

- I'm continuing to get CC offers in the mail that are very intriguing. Rather than wait to do a full-blown second AOR a year after the first one, I may take some of these offers along the way. Anyone else have experience with this? For example, I received a Disney rewards CC offer with 0% on purchases and BTs until 10/08 with a $50 cap on the BT fee...kind of hard to pass that up. Perhaps going somewhat conservative with the BT amounts is paying off.

cardjuggler said:ahself said:Rather than wait to do a full-blown second AOR a year after the first one, I may take some of these offers along the way. Anyone else have experience with this? For example, I received a Disney rewards CC offer with 0% on purchases and BTs until 10/08 with a $50 cap on the BT fee...kind of hard to pass that up. Perhaps going somewhat conservative with the BT amounts is paying off.
Go for it! And let us know the result. Per the Dave Hanson strategy (and especially after bumping lots of inquiries), you're likely to get it with a good CL ... unless they pull EXP.

A quick update on the Disney offer. I finally got around to applying for it over the phone. Wouldn't you know it, they did pull EXP, even though the previous Chase/First USA pulls were on EQ. Regardless, I was approved for a $9k limit...not great, but the terms are good and I should be able to roll credit lines and balances (e.g. Sony) over next March when my initial 0% offers are up. The terms are as explained above, except that it's 0% thru 11/08...even better.

BTW, I was curious about the EXP score TrueCredit was giving me since it was so much lower than the other two. I had an offer for a free 12 months of EXP Triple Advantage and tried it out. It shows my EXP "Plus" score as 768. I know these are all FAKO scores, but I imagine my true EXP score is higher than the 689 that TrueCredit shows and that's why I was approved for this Disney card.