Final update on credit limits
For the past year we have been aggressively pursuing higher limits on each of our credit cards. At the beginning of each month we attempted to raise the limits on each of our credit cards by requesting a credit line increase without performing any hard inquiries on our credit reports (as explained in strategies on raising your credit limit).
The motivation for doing so is provided by one of our goals we have committed to for next year - we want to completely pay down the second mortgage by the end of 2007. The plan is to apply any extra funds available during the remaining months of this year to the principal in hopes of getting the balance down under $10,000. In January 2007 we will utilize a no-fee 0% balance transfer offer to facilitate the gradual paying down of this debt throughout 2007.
We had expected to see another round of increases this month, but it did not happen. Every issuer required an additional hard inquiry to request a credit line increase which we are unwilling to do. This marks the third month in a row where we have been unable to raise the limits on any of our credit accounts. This is mostly due to the fact that a couple of the cards we are currently using are not quite old enough and the older cards are no longer being utilized which precludes us from qualifying for inquiry-free limit increases on these accounts.
So, we proceeded as planned and moved the available credit from two credit cards we no longer intend to use and closed the accounts. We reallocated the $11,400 in available credit on the Citi Driver’s Edge card to the Citi Dividend to bring the limit up to $23,200. This now makes the Dividend card our largest credit line to date. We also reallocated the $3,800 in available credit on the old Chase Profit card to the recently acquired Chase Chas Plus Rewards to bring the limit up to $13,800.
I expect the accounts closed to have a minimal impact on our credit scores since these were both opened not too long ago. However, if we were concerned about our credit scores I would have elected not to close the accounts.
We’ll continue to work on building our lines of credit in the future, but won’t be as aggressive as we have been and won’t make any reoccurring notes on here about our progress.
In conclusion, we accomplished what we set out to do – getting our credit limits up to a reasonable level so that we may transfer the outstanding second mortgage balance using a 0% offer in 2007. We were able to double our highest credit limit and our average credit line within twelve months time.
The motivation for doing so is provided by one of our goals we have committed to for next year - we want to completely pay down the second mortgage by the end of 2007. The plan is to apply any extra funds available during the remaining months of this year to the principal in hopes of getting the balance down under $10,000. In January 2007 we will utilize a no-fee 0% balance transfer offer to facilitate the gradual paying down of this debt throughout 2007.
We had expected to see another round of increases this month, but it did not happen. Every issuer required an additional hard inquiry to request a credit line increase which we are unwilling to do. This marks the third month in a row where we have been unable to raise the limits on any of our credit accounts. This is mostly due to the fact that a couple of the cards we are currently using are not quite old enough and the older cards are no longer being utilized which precludes us from qualifying for inquiry-free limit increases on these accounts.
So, we proceeded as planned and moved the available credit from two credit cards we no longer intend to use and closed the accounts. We reallocated the $11,400 in available credit on the Citi Driver’s Edge card to the Citi Dividend to bring the limit up to $23,200. This now makes the Dividend card our largest credit line to date. We also reallocated the $3,800 in available credit on the old Chase Profit card to the recently acquired Chase Chas Plus Rewards to bring the limit up to $13,800.
I expect the accounts closed to have a minimal impact on our credit scores since these were both opened not too long ago. However, if we were concerned about our credit scores I would have elected not to close the accounts.
We’ll continue to work on building our lines of credit in the future, but won’t be as aggressive as we have been and won’t make any reoccurring notes on here about our progress.
In conclusion, we accomplished what we set out to do – getting our credit limits up to a reasonable level so that we may transfer the outstanding second mortgage balance using a 0% offer in 2007. We were able to double our highest credit limit and our average credit line within twelve months time.
posted by Brian at
11:31 AM
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