I was not originally going to post this, but I changed my mind since: 1.) I have learned a lot from you guys and all the cards in my list were found here. 2.) I have already compiled the list of cards, and future users may benefit. 3.) Someone may have some constructive feedback for me on my AOR.
I am pretty much using credit cards to my advantage as free loans rather than making money off of the offers.
HHI: $100K Age: 24
Scores TU EX EQ
PM123 719 715 709
Inquiries TU EX EQ
Within 12 months 0 0 0
Within 24 months 3 3 6
Existing Accounts
Credit Card Type Limit Util Age
Bank of America Platinum Plus $2,000 31% 1.4
Capital One Platinum $750 0% 2.1
Chase Montecristo $5,000 0% 2
Citi Associated Bank $6,000 50% 1.1
Citi AT&T Universal $1,000 0% 1.1
Citi Professional Cash $2,500 47% 1.1
Citi MTVu Platinum Select $4,500 0% 1.1
Household Bank Platinum $3,000 49% 1.1
US Bank Rewards Platinum $7,000 49% 1.3
Wells Fargo Platinum $5,400 0% 3.6
$37,150 26%
I also have one student loan at $6000.
Potential Applications (alphabetical order):
Issuer Card BT Fee, BT Period, Purchase Period, Bureau Pull
Advanta Kiva Business $90 15 0 EX
AMEXBlue Personal 3% 12 0
Bank of America Hello Kitty Personal $75 12 0
Bank of America NEA Accelerated Rewards AMEX Personal $30 12 0 EX
Bank of America NEA Platinum Plus w/ Worldpoints Personal $30 12 0 EX
Bank of America Platinum Plus MasterCard Worldpoints Personal 3% 15 0 EX
Bank of America WorldPoint Rewards Business 3% 0 12
Capital One Business Platinum with Cash Business 3% 12 12 EX/TU?
Chase Disney Personal $75 12 12 TU
Citi ADA Personal $0 12 0
Citi Business Business $0 12 0 EQ
Citi Driver's Edge Personal 3% 6 or 12 0
Citi Platinum Select MC Personal 3% 6,9 or 12 12 EQ
Discover More Personal 3% 12 6
Juniper Business Bank Atlantic Business $75 15 0 TU?
Juniper Farm Bureau Bank Personal $50 12 0
Juniper I Fly America Visa Personal $50 12 0 TU
Juniper Rec Rewards MC Personal $75 12 12 TU, EQ, EX
State Farm Good Neighbor Visa Personal $0 9 0
US Bank Irish Visa Platinum Personal $0 12 12 EQ/TU?
US_Bank PBR_Visa_Signature Personal $0 12 12
Wachovia Visa Platinum w/ Rewards Personal $99 12 0
The cards that seem to be offering the highest limits / I might apply for first are:
BOFA NEA Platinum Plus w/ Worldpoints
BOFA Platinum Plus MasterCard
Chase Disney
Juniper Business Bank Atlantic
Juniper I Fly America Visa
Juniper Rec Rewards MasterCard
US Bank Irish Visa Platinum
Then I will just apply to cards with the better offers first.
** I would have loved to apply to for the Citi ADA card, but its intro APR has unfortunately been removed. ** Edit: Found link and updated table above - hope it works.
The US Bank Linux card also reduced its BT offering.
Questions:
1.) Am I missing any good deals? Such as $0 BT fee or 0% 12+ months purchasing.
2.) Multiple applications: Should I not apply for so many Citi / Juniper / Bank of America cards?
3.) The two BOFA NEA cards seem almost identical, is there advantage to the AMEX version?
4.) How do you make proper tables within these threads?
I am guessing a 50/50 or worse outcome of declined/approved apps, but the new cards will help me so I am going to apply anyway. Hopefully someone will have some great ideas over the weekend, and I will be scouring the internet a bit more for deals that I may have missed.
After my AOR, I will try to increase the credit limits of existing cards that require hard pulls.
Thanks in advance for any suggestions!
_____________
RESULTS (4/26):
----------------------
Thank you for all your feedback. Due to words of caution, I applied for just five accounts - 3 which were approved. I believe I could have applied for
more cards, but I will probably have even better results next time with my new CLs.
Here are the cards I applied for, all of which were deferred:
Bank Credit Card Type BT Limit CLR Notes
Citi ADA Personal $11,000 ---> Will probably try to CLR before BT
US Bank Irish Visa Platinum Personal $4,000* $8,500 ---> Couldn't CLR my other US Bank card.
Chase Disney Personal $3,775 $4,200 ---> CLRed $4500 from Chase MonteCristo = $8,700
Bank of America NEA Platinum Plus w/ Worldpoints Personal Denied
Juniper Business Bank Atlantic Business Denied
$23,700
*BTed into BofA who sent me a check.
Unfortunately, my PM123 subsciption expired so I no longer have access to scores. I may try to apply for some more cards in a month or so.
Message edited by: StallionKing on 2009-04-26 23:51:35 CDT
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Questions: 1.) Am I missing any good deals? Such as $0 BT fee or 0% 12+ months purchasing your list looks good to me - others will likely have added options to consider.
2.) Multiple applications: Should I not apply for so many Citi / Juniper / Bank of America cards? I think 2 Citi, 1 biz + 1 personal Barclays (Juniper) and 2 BofA cards are sufficient.
3.) The two BOFA NEA cards seem almost identical, is there advantage to the AMEX version? I'll defer to others. IMO, no difference.
4.) How do you make proper tables within these threads? It's a bit tricky and requires some learning/effort. After learning, you may become addicted to using the code tag. In the example below, I am using parentheses around the letter 'c'. In actual practice, you need to use brackets like this > [ ] and place spaces inbetween the columns...
Yeah I noticed that too, balances on 5 cards? I would think you should have 1-2 tops. How long are you planning to carry those balances? Do you have the cash to cover them?
I'm not sure why my column (c) tags don't come out right, but it looks better now since I can use more than one space character.
I've added the US Bank PBR card to my list.
I am wondering about the order of my applications. Should I use: Bureau pull information to figure out the order Apply by order of preference Apply to cards that are harder to get first Use a mix of the above? Is it possible to know which cards are easier or harder to get?I'm happy to help and provide feedback.
That said, I am more eager to do so if you do little bit more homework 1st. Thus far, I can see a total of 5 posts to the community and they appear to be questions with limited citations documenting your efforts to answer the original questions on your own.
An hypothetical example of a better post might be like this:
I have readhereandhereabout how to close a WAMU savings account but didn't find a specific answer to a dilemma I'm having. Rather than posting in the two aforementioned threads, I am starting a new on because my question is specific to a POD (Payable On Death) account.
Here it goes:
When signing up with WAMU, I added POD with my wifes name. She is not authorized to conduct financial transactions on the account while I am living. Do I have to add her as an authorized user of the account or do I have to send in a durable powere of attorney for finances? Are WAMU requirements state specific or applicable nationwide?
StallionKing said:After my A0R, I will try to increase the credit limits of existing cards that require hard pulls.You should be aware that in this environment, your whole A0R may backfire, especially that last bit. When you request the credit line increases, and the issuers see all those new inquiries, they may end up slashing your existing lines instead.
edited to correct spelling
Message edited by: cashmonkey on 2009-03-26 19:03:58 CDT
cashmonkey said:StallionKing said:After my A0R, I will try to increase the credit limits of existing cards that require hard pulls.You should be aware that in this environment, your whole A0R may backfire I agree. This AOR is too ambitious IMO given his mediocre credit profile (low credit lines, relatively high utilization, etc) and the current credit environment. My husband recently applied for the Citi Forward card and got a CL that is <0.4% of his income even though he has only one large balance on his credit report (admittedly, it's from Citi). StallionKing already has balances at Citi and BofA, so I seriously doubt they are going to extend much more credit.
5 BoA, 4 Juniper? No way -- even back in the good old days. Do some research, e.g. the CC Issuer FAQ.
To echo others: your starting balances are high for a successful AOR.
If you're desperate for credit and not limited to uncapped 0%, there are actually tons of offers from smaller banks & CUs, though it requires a bit of research beyond Fat Wallet.
StallionKing said:I am pretty much using credit cards to my advantage as free loans rather than making money off of the offers.
OK. You spend more than you make. That's a bad habit you need to break, if possible.
StallionKing said:Unfortunately I don't have the cash to cover these balances now, and will transfer them to the new cards I receive.
These balances are the biggest thing hurting my credit score, which I have tried to maximize by having <50% utilization on all cards.
Dude, the credit bubble popped months ago.... it's way too late to AOR your way out of the hole by playing the balance transfer game. Banks are not stupid like they were last year. Your existing creditors will CLD and close your accounts when they see all those apps.
Another poster mentioned CU and small banks. That requires research because some of them are quite skittish too. Don't assume CU = easy credit.
Forget the AOR game. You need to save up and actually pay down the debt instead. Stop worrying about your FICO score so much. Your FICO isn't killing you - it's the debt itself. Opt out of rate changes and eat the account closure, because APR increases will make it harder to pay down the debt. Find a way to save more than you spend and pay down the debt.
Message edited by: jmw11 on 2009-03-26 22:38:51 CDT
I have to agree with what other people are saying. Your utilizaton rate is high. The AOR+BT game should be deferred till you have paid down your balances. If you are having trouble doing this, then you need to analyze why. You may also want to consider taking a part-time job to help with the repayment.
My fakos are about the same as yours with 200K in AOR money showing on my report. I would wait and pay off your balances. I know that I wouldn't apply for anything with my current score.
In Oct 2007 my AOR had 21 cards, too. But my util was pretty low, my scores were healthier than yours, I had bigger CLs than you, etc. The AOR went OK.
But very important was the credit environment. 19 months ago, it was still fairly ripe for AOR pickings. In contrast, I saw little use in doing much more than a 7-card mini-AOR this week. (FWIW all apps were deferred.)
I have to echo the others' comments here. I'll add that I've seen in other recent AOR threads that applying for multiple Citi Cards simultaneously seems not to work. After you do the first one, all of the other ones are declined with the reason that Citi is already processing an application.
Do a rolling AOR when your score reaches 740 or above and you should be sucessful.
The order of business is to roll over the balances from one card that is near expiring on promotional rate with a new card with a promotional rate. Meaning you pay down your priors and get some additional new money to increase both the time you have BT money (old promo time + new promo time) and work your way up with additional principal to safe invest/hold. Also, it keeps your inquiries down to the minimum with some rolling off after 2 years, some rolling over 6 months, etc.
IMHO, try: 1. Go for a card (or 2) that only BT to existing cards. 2. Once you know that status, go for about 2 (or 3) others cards that would BT to checking/issue check to self.
Message edited by: telflonmail on 2009-03-27 09:37:47 CDT
I would say your scores are fairly low and you have balances on the cards. Most of your cards are not going to be instantly approved but will be deferred. (Speaking from my AOR 5-6 months ago...My previous utilization was less then 10% and my scores were 770+. I compiled a huge list of cards, ultimately getting rid of any card with a non capped 3%. My reasoning was that the profit from those cards would not be worth the extra effort. Profit from a card = (Interest rate recevied - Bt fee ) * (1 - your marginal tax rate.) I wasn't willing to keep track of 2 rewards accounts with all of the purchases and felt that my chance at an error would have been too great. Didn't do anything with AMEX. I wasn't willing to take a miles card, and didn't find a good bt card. Good luck with them. They seem to be agressively CLD everyone. Juniper was bad to me. I had an Emigrant Direct card for a good 4 years before. Then approved me for an Ifly card with a limit of 2.5K and refused to consolidate with the Emigrant card. The BT fee on the I fly card wouldn't have been worth it, so I didn't use it, Juniper closed the card without telling me, and only two weeks later did I receive a letter. Glad I didn't use it in that time. Us Bank denied my Linux card app. Citi and Boa were good to me but BoA took my existing credit line and moved it to the new card so I could open it. (Citi also reversed a late fee for me) State farm was decent. ( And also had no problem reversing a late fee)
My question is, what will you do with the money you get? Capped BT fees really shine when you get a large CL, which you may not because of your low CS and higher balances.
StallionKing - at this point you need to BUILD credit, not use it. your scores arent going to get you great limits. HOWEVER, i would definitely apply for SOMETHING, if for no other reason than to decrease your overall util%, because it is high. if i was in your spot, i would absolutely wait until i got my util below 10%, which should help your score, then apply.
if you insist on AORing, i would recommend about 5 apps max, and i wouldnt bother with any Biz cards, as they dont show on your CRAs (except Discover) and you need them to...also, you dont appear to care about interest rate arbitrage, so making money off them isnt a priority. I dont think you will get the AM3X Blue card. Anyway, i recommend these:
BofA NEA (mainly because the $30 BT cap is permanent) USBank Linux/Irish Chase Disney Juniper Ifly Citi...one of the two. sorry you missed the ADA card.
solarUS said:StallionKing - at this point you need to BUILD credit, not use it. your scores arent going to get you great limits. HOWEVER, i would definitely apply for SOMETHING, if for no other reason than to decrease your overall util%, because it is high. if i was in your spot, i would absolutely wait until i got my util below 10%, which should help your score, then apply.
if you insist on AORing, i would recommend about 5 apps max, and i wouldnt bother with any Biz cards, as they dont show on your CRAs (except Discover) and you need them to...also, you dont appear to care about interest rate arbitrage, so making money off them isnt a priority. I dont think you will get the AM3X Blue card. Anyway, i recommend these:
BofA NEA (mainly because the $30 BT cap is permanent) USBank Linux/Irish Chase Disney Juniper Ifly Citi...one of the two. sorry you missed the ADA card.
that'll be 3 TU pulls and 2 EQ or EX.I agree. It's now dated, but I did something similar a year ago here.
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_____________
RESULTS (4/26):
----------------------
Thank you for all your feedback. Due to words of caution, I applied for just five accounts - 3 which were approved. I believe I could have applied for
more cards, but I will probably have even better results next time with my new CLs.
Here are the cards I applied for, all of which were deferred:
