Ok I am going to start a Wife-O-Rama this week. Possibly tomorrow. I posted her info in the quick summary.

She doesn't have much in the way of major credit cards. Two Chase and one HSBC. She used to have a Citi but they closed it on her due to inactivity (bastards). She may have another Citi lying around based on her CR. I am going to ask her to call them to find out.

She has very good credit scores so I am hoping that her scores along with the HHI will net her some decent limits. I used many of the same credit card offers that I used on mine, but I weeded out some of the crap that I learned from my AOR.

Oh and I have to also find a daily spender for her to use. Right now she is using a Chase card... but she may be better off using a different bank (maybe one that doesn't have as generous BT offers so I can reallocate Chase). She likes the Chase cash rewards because it credits her statement every month so it would be good to find something similar.

Received a TON of cards today in the mail. Felt like a kid on Christmas.

Anyways... received a few new approvals:

RBS Platinum Mastercard: 8,000 Limit
Wachovia Visa Signature: 10,000 Limit
AMEX SimplyCash: 3,000 Limit

M&T Bank sent a letter wanting the name of my business. Should I give my name as my business? Should I pursue this further? Thoughts?

I am still waiting for the Chase business card to arrive and hopefully be approved. Does Chase business normally take this long?

Squeezer99 said:pics of the wife?

get a penfed visa for everyday spending. 5% on gas purchased at the pump, 1.25% on everything else.

Doesn't she have to be a member of Penfed to apply? I am already a member but she is not on any of my accounts.

I do not think she will want to get the Penfed because she will probably want one of her OWN cards... you know one that she can hide the statements from me.

Where are you parking your BT money ?

I called Discover about my Business account with them. The account was still pending (maybe a letter is on the way to me). She asked me the nature of my business... projected revenue (I keep telling people $0 when they ask this question that I don't want to lie).

Well after all of that she gave me a $5000 limit for the Business Miles card. Not bad I guess. Tomorrow ill try to reallocate the Discover Personal to Business and then do the BT.

I called M&T this morning and they said they cannot process the information unless I give them an actual company name. They do not accept my name to go under the company name. I could have given them a BS name to start... but I had a feeling they would probably try to do a search for this company name. They also said they haven't run my credit report yet and they couldn't until they received this info.

Another user on here reported that they actually asked for a business license. Sounds like you need to jump through a lot of hoops to get one of these cards. It might be best to just drop this application... not worth it for a 6 month BT.

Called National City personal accounts and found out the card was shipped and I was approved for 15,000. VERY NICE since thats a $0 12mo offer.

Very pleased with this AOR. Just waiting on Chase business now.

Nice AOR!

Would it be possible for you to show the % util on each card you did a BT. It looks like you've gone way over the FWF recommendation of 49% on personal but I can't be sure.

Thanks.

DjPiLL said:I was doing a little pre-number crunching to find out how many MMAs I have to open to stay under the 100k FDIC limit... and when I add up all my future BT money as well as the money I currently have in HYS for my Citi 0% for life deal... I will be starting off at 180k of BT money earning interest. Daym!

Now I just have to figure out how to avoid adverse action. LOL

For those that have asked where I am going to park my money... I am most likely going to go with a Countrywide & Indymac while doing most of my billpaying from Indymac. I will use Bank Of America AAA as a backup.... but I don't like the idea of parking cash with a bank that I currently hold a high BT balance with.

It would probably be very unwise of me to screw around with AMEX and CLIs while I am carrying this high a balance so I probably won't push the envelope in risk of a FR. I'll definitely keep using 30k WaMu, 24k Penfed, and 13.5k GE Money for utilization. I will need it.

I am even considering making my wife an AU on my WaMu so she gets that utilization benefit as well. Think thats worth it?
FWIW, I'm "parking" (love that term) my money at SBoT in their Hometown Rewards Checking account. Unlike BoA, their rates haven't gone down for this product, instead they've lowered the rates for some of their other prodcuts a bit. There are no guarantees, but a rep tells me they have every intention of keeping their 6.01% APY, and they're trying to persuade more of their local customers to switch to this Rewards Checking account because its costs are a lot lower than their other accounts.

Also unlike BoA, there is just one interest rate, as long as you meet the monthly requirements. As you know, setting up a joint account will make up to 200K FDIC insured. Their bill pay is easy to use with the same type of features as BoA's on-line banking, although I like BoA's user interface better. You also have unlimited checking/bill pay with no penalty, unlike a MMA with BoA and others, which have a limited number of withdrawals during a statement period. (I was told you can get around the withdrawal limit by establishing a BoA MRA (Master Relationship Account) and "sweeping" the money between BoA checking and the BoA MMA account.)

The main negatives are that opening the account isn't as streamlined as at banks like BoA, it takes about 3 weeks to get the check card, and you have to meet the requirements to get that 6.01% APY. On the other hand, so far they've been accurate with accruing interest at the correct rate, unlike BoA.

Here is the big question for the experts here: What should I do with my AMEX? Should I ask for CLIs just for utilization?

With all the available BT money... I don't think its worth pulling money from AMEX. But if I can get away with a CLI for utilization i'd be willing to do that.