Keep the float going in bad times... AOR 2.5 -> Results

The AOR game has been profitable and successful so far. Many thanks to the FWF community and all I have learned and hopefully I can learn a bit more on this AOR.

For my previous AOR's please see the following links: My AOR 1.0 8-2007 Wife's AOR 1.0 10-2007 My AOR 2.0 12-2008

In the past, my goals were simple: BT money for interest and sign-up bonus's. On my last AOR, I combo'd it with dropping my 15 year 4.5% note for a prime -1.01% HELOC thus making my interest rate floor 2.249% on my remaining balance see here. So far it has been a good gamble saving me about 5K for one year in addition to the generated interest.

I decided to alternate AOR's for my wife and I because of the lack of return because of the low interest rates. The last AOR I did was for myself. This one is for her. If there was more of a return, I would continue to run them similtaneously.

The goals for this AOR are:
1. Obtain 60K minimum to keep my float going while I pay off the remaining HELOC. Figure for 60K my current saved interest is $1334 for a year which makes this still worth while.
2. Watch the capped BT fees. In the past 1% overall cap was no big deal but now at ~1.5% interest in savings accounts it is a wash after taxes. Even at 2.24% on the Heloc the real interest rate is about 1.48% after deduction.
3. Signup bonus's.
4. Keep it simple! If the returns aren't there it is not worth chasing low limit cards. Cap the apps at about 10.
5. No bumping. I didn't bump on my last one and it had no effect.

Stats:
HHI: $210K
AGE: 32
Inquiries: (TU / EXP / EQ) : 0/0/1
Score: Too lazy to sign up 760 - 800 expected

Credit lines are all from 10-07 and have remained in tact. Estimated 150K personal and 75K business. Low utilization on shared cards less than 15% per card and 2% overall.
No mortgage shows on credit report.

Right now I need FWF help in gathering the 0% cards. The deals are getting fewer and far between I'll be happy to post a consolidated list and results just like my last AOR's. Every link of consolidated 0% offers is badly out of date and in need of updating. So far I have found:

APR Mo. BT Fee BT Fee Issuer   Card                         Apply  Notes 
0%  12   0     $0     US Bank  Baylor Alumni card           apply  Deferred  Approved 20K ->25k via CLR may try for more with a financial review -> CLI to 43.5K
0%  12   3%    $75    Chase    OptionsXpress Platinum Visa  apply  Deferred - Approved 20K (see Tips and Tricks)
0%  6    0     $0     Barclays Harvard MasterCard (Alumni)  apply  Deferred Approved 20K
0%  6    0     $0     5/3      1st Southwest card           apply  Deferred Approved 15K
0%  6    uncap $0     Citi     Forward                      apply  Professional Replacement card (5%) Deferred Approved 7K (took the line from ATT Universal card) will CLR the rest and close

Order above is the applied for order.

I would really like to find a Citi 12 month card, BOA 12 month card, NC/PNC card and others that don't low limit you. I will not do a 6 month card with a BT Fee. Help is appreciated!

Results:
43.4K from US Bank filtered 25K through Citi (My old AOR)and 18.4K HELOC
29.5K Chase filtered through BOA daily spender, and will request a refund
Harvard card 19.9K check written to myself
1st Southwest Bank 14.9K through HELOC

72.9K 12 month 0%
34.8K 6 month money
BT Fee paid $75.00

Bonus's:
11K TYP valued at $110
1st SouthWest $149 cash reward for the BT

Reserved for current Tips and Tricks:

1-9-10
It appears that US bank will give a line above 25K with a financial review and will CLR from a current card to 25K without hassle if you have the line from other cards.

1-12-10
Citi will still CLR and had no issues moving the rest of the ATT card that they took from to the new Forward card.

1st Southwest will only pay off a creditor so I am having them send a check of 14.9K to the HELOC company.

I still hate Chase! I get a note today that I am approved for 20K (sounds good) but they closed all of the other Chase cards with lines totaling 31.5K for business and about 27K personal. I am going to have my wife call on Monday.

1-19-10
Sony card restored to 10K and Options Express CLI'd to 30K. Net CL loss of 18K but I really don't care. Preparing for the BT fight with Chase. Noticed in the T&C sent with the card that the BT is uncapped. Printed out the T&C when the app was submitted.

1-22-10
Initiated a BT from Chase Options to my FIA daily spender card. Will request the balance back after it hits. This was the only way I could get the money out of Chase in the first 90 days, they will not BT to an HELOC and the welcome checks are gone. After 90 days, I could have ACH'd to checking but I didn't want to wait 3 months. Harvard card I wrote a check to myself.

1-25-10
US bank review came back and upped the line to 43.5K did the last 18.4K to heloc.

2-12-10
Finally got the credit refund of 24K from my FIA card (Chase sent 29.5K over), last payment posted to HELOC, ended up with a $44 interest bill for the one month.

2-18-10 What a mess from FIA, see details on last page.

DML - glad to see another HELOC/A0R gamer. I'm in the same prime-1.01% product with you.

Could you help clarify your inquiry count? I don't see how you're at 0/0/1 with no bumping an A0R as recently as 12/08. Thanks.

Always happy to see more posts re A0R activity. Best of luck, dm!

I saw that your DW was approved for a meager 1500 business line with 5th 3rd bank. Might she/you consider applying for a 1st Southwest card?

6 months and $0 fee

jackcrawfish said: I saw that your DW was approved for a meager 1500 business line with 5th 3rd bank. Might she/you consider applying for a 1st Southwest card?

6 months and $0 fee

Has anyone got a real line with 5/3? My wife got a $500 line last time and I got a 5K line on a pre-approved platinum last time. At 5K it's not worth it for the hard pull.

dmlavigne1 said: mungbai said: GreyRabbit said: From my experience Us Bank and Barclays are best to stick to 1 card each.
The 3% BT fee + $75 seems really really bad.
Unfortunatly I can't offer any links because I don't know of any.
Not sure if you have a Wachovia Way2Save account, but with a max of 5 accounts per SSN and a 1st year yield of rougly 7.6%, it seems worth it, even with a cap of $1200 per account.

No problems getting a second US Bank card here.

What lines did you get? I figure to get a 25K line and if multiple cards are capped at 25K it doesn't matter.

Based on my 8/2009 experience, US Bank does reject the 2nd application as a "duplicate" even before pulling the 2nd credit inquiry. On the positive side, you can call them afterwards and ask for a real substantial CLI with documentation.

Use the search

Edit: searching for bumping brings up one thread (and only one thread) that has all you need to know

I stand by use the search

dmlavigne1 said: What lines did you get? I figure to get a 25K line and if multiple cards are capped at 25K it doesn't matter.

Sorry, I'm a dummy, I thought you were just getting one US Bank card this time round. My second card came a year after my first app, operated to continue to float the first card, through an intermediary account, of course. It was 12k.

I did a search on bumping....nothing found.

I think that citi home rebate link is dead. You can't get through to the "apply" section.

Rorer714 said: What about cards with 12mo 0% on purchases? Maybe buy some coins or gift cards. It would be more work.DiscoverMORE for 6 months here

ETA: the Discover link in this post is 0% for 6 months ONLY on purchases

jackcrawfish said: Rorer714 said: What about cards with 12mo 0% on purchases? Maybe buy some coins or gift cards. It would be more work.DiscoverMORE for 6 months here

Thanks, I'll add it but Discover has been a huge pain on my previous AOR's (CLI, CLR, reducing lines, etc) that I did not bother on the last AOR. I might use it if anyone can confirm real lines.

Thanks for posting AOR details. Would you mind also adding what wife's current open cards and limits are? Are you closing any cards or reducing limits in preparation? It would be good to see what creditors are willing to offer given existing exposure compared to previous years.

Nomikal said: jackcrawfish said: dmlavigne1 said: jackcrawfish said: I saw that your DW was approved for a meager 1500 business line with 5th 3rd bank. Might she/you consider applying for a 1st Southwest card?

6 months and $0 fee

Has anyone got a real line with 5/3? My wife got a $500 line last time and I got a 5K line on a pre-approved platinum last time. At 5K it's not worth it for the hard pull.my DW got $18000 and I was approved for $12000 (while carrying a $35000 Bank of America debt)

eta: James Hasty got $9500

I got $9000. They only do CC->CC BTs, right? How are you going to extract the money?For our 1st Southwest cards, we had them send a check to "payoff our line of credit" (aka send a deposit to my checking account). To clear my conscience, I took a small $100 advance before the 1st southwest check arrived.

dmlavigne1 said: jackcrawfish said: Rorer714 said: What about cards with 12mo 0% on purchases? Maybe buy some coins or gift cards. It would be more work.DiscoverMORE for 6 months here

Thanks, I'll add it but Discover has been a huge pain on my previous AOR's (CLI, CLR, reducing lines, etc) that I did not bother on the last AOR. I might use it if anyone can confirm real lines.

I got a Discover Business line @ $22K in March 08 and did a 90% BT with absolutely no problems. One of the things I recall liking about them is that it was easy to set up a minimum +$1 autopay.

2Cor521

I am not planning on closing any cards prior to this AOR because of the tighting of the credit market unless someone who RECENTLY did the same had a good result. I will update the links to the apps this weekend with what has been suggested. The CL's for my wife are close to what was documented in the Wife's AOR thread in the OP.

People, remember when posting suggestions that this is going on 2010 and what happened in 2007, 2008, early 2009 is probably not valid anymore. In my previous AOR's it was the CLR wild west. That doesn't exist anymore.

As far as CC->CC extraction, if I complete this AOR before mid January, I can pay off my AOR with my wifes money, which hadn't been a problem in the past or I will have a draw on my HELOC which is an "account number" which qualifies at US Bank and probably 5/3.

Is anyone getting than more than 1.5% savings/CD rates? After incomestaxes that is probably say 1.25%. Is it really worth it unless of course there are bonuses on cards which have almost disappeared.

How about Penfed? They have a BT promo 5% for 24 months (capped fee $100).

rsean78 said: How about Penfed? They have a BT promo 5% for 24 months (capped fee $100).

5% after tax is >>>>>>>>> 2.24% before tax.

dmlavigne1 said: Dima9 said: SO if you get $10K CL, is the rule of thumb to only utilize 80% BT?

I utilize the max, and fight the adverse action.Any adverse action from this early 2010 AOR?