I have too many credit cards to say the least. I didnot expect to get approvals, got carried away and now have alot of credit cards. The best thing is they are cards with some decent terms. I am thinking of closing PRovidian now before the next annual fee is due. It is due 5/01. I just opened a new providian account for $1K. That was dumb. But I think I will close BOTH providian: the one year account and the one month account. The oldest has a cl of $2800 and I am pissed they havenot raise it in months or offered me gold status yet. I just got a Gold Household card for $2K and a classic GM card for $3500 both with good transfer balance rates. Besides that I have 2 citibanks accounts with high credit limits.($9K each) And a Chase Shopnow.com card for $2K credit limit. And a capital one gold card for $2900 credit limit. I have 3 retail card: Target, Victoria Secrets, and Macy's and Spiegel (all with 0 balances) I recently closed Orchard,First PRemier, another capital one account and FCNB all in the past 6 months. Does anyone have any suggestions? roni
Roni, I personally would dump the recent providian, that's not helping your score anyway, I would however keep the year old card atleast until you close on your house. I wouldn't do anything drastic with your credit UNLESS the lender specifically told you to close something.
Just talk to retention, they'll waive your annual fee. Then its worth keeping it for the balance to ratio help it will give you.
Customer service reps can also waive the fee. I had a rep credit my account without question. The do this for me every year.
Ok guys. I will call and have the fee waived. This never works out for me and providian for some reason. They take me as a joke. But since I may really close this time.......
My quick count is 11 open accounts + a car loan. I don't think this is a big deal to have that many temporarily. Unless the lender asks you to close something I would do nothing right now. FICO is so complex, you might even hurt yourself. Also, I am no expert but when I got an FHA loan in the 80's credit cards were somewhat ignored in the lend decision. Unless of course you weren't paying your bills. I know you pay yours on time as I do. Why don't you keep the accounts for at least 2 years and build a really superb credit history.
Re: My quick count is 11 I would dump the new providian, Target and Macy's for their lower credit limits
Re: Providian Roni, I agree with Mom. If you dump either Providian card, it should be the newer one. That would be a MasterCard, right? My own Providian MasterCard is just another annual fee I'm trying to get rid of. Here's another thought. Once you're determined to close the account, you have a really strong negotiating position. You could end up with great terms on both Providian cards. Then you could close the MasterCard anyway, if you want to reduce your number of accounts.
