My husband called MBNA because he was thinking about asking for an increase. He's had his MBNA Visa since 1993 and has a perfect payment history. He rarely uses the card. He got me a card on this account and I use it for some thing but we usually pay it all off and maybe one time had a high balance owed of about $500 which we paid off in two or three payments. He asked the rep if requesting an increase would cause them to do a hard inquiry or was his perfect history all these years sufficient. He was told that they'd do a hard inquiry. The rep then asked if he was considering making a large purchase or something and that was why he was asking for the increase. He said no, he was only considering asking for an increase because if we at some point apply for a mortgage or something it might look odd that someone with such a lengthy perfect history only has a $1,000 limit on their Visa card. The rep said that nothing could be further from the truth and the limit only points out that we don't use much credit and pay what we do use in a timely way. He said the only reason to ask for an increase would be if he wanted to make a purchase. I've seen lots of posts here regarding limits being too low and wondered what you all think of this rep's point of view. He decided not to try for the increase. He doesn't want a hard inquiry at this time and honestly wouldn't use the extra credit anyway. Thoughts?
My thoughts. 90% of the people that post in this forum know more about credit issues than that rep. does. I had a supervisor at Amex tell me last month it was impossible for me to get my credit scores. If you have zero balances and low limits, yes, your score will be higher. If you have small balances and high limits your score will be higher. I once had credit card limits around 2000 and balances of about 1800 my scores were low 600's. I paid them all off and 2 months later my scores shot up to over 700. It's real freakin' simple. All things being equal the higher revolving credit available the higher the score. I guess the moral of the story is: If you want to carry high balances and keep your score high, you better have high limits. Just my thoughts.
Spend $600 on a credit line of $1,000...60% Spend $600 on a credit line of $10,000...6% BIG DIFFERENCE...I WOULDN'T TAKE A CREDIT LINE OF $1,000 EVEN ON A DARE...
My thoughts. The more cards the better, the higher the limits the better, the lower the balances the better. Dealing from strength in the credit world requires the ability to carry balances at less than 10% APR. It is easy to do when you have lots of credit available. www.creditsense.com
