A little background information: I am 20 years old and have had a credit card since I was 18. I currently have four credit cards: Bank of America Unlimited Cash Rewards, Capital One Quicksilver, American Express Blue Cash Everyday, and Wells Fargo Active Cash. I have never missed a payment and always pay my full statement balance. However, I am wondering whether there is such a thing as having too many credit cards or applying for too many in a short period of time. I would like to take advantage of credit card sign-up bonuses, but I am unsure if applying for another card would be a bad idea. It has been almost six months since my last application, and I am concerned about whether having too many credit cards could negatively affect me. If I should apply for a new card what card should I plan to get next?
How many is too many credit cards
byu/AVEquinox inCreditCards
Posted by AVEquinox
11 Comments
For FICO scoring purposes, having at least 3 cards constituted as a thick profile.
Other than that, have as many as you want. As long as you keep paying off your statement balance in full before the due date each month and thus, won’t ever pay any interest.
How many is “too many” depends on the individual.
For someone that carries balances and throws away money to interest, 1 credit card is too many.
For someone that pays their statement balances in full monthly and finds value in a large lineup, a dozen or more cards may not be “too many” to them.
The world record holder possesses 1638 cards. I’d imagine that’s too many, for most 😉
> or applying for too many in a short period of time.
Other people gave good answers for the other part, but here – there is a FICO score penalty for a “spree” of new accounts. It isn’t super well understood but I believe the current wisdom is that it falls off after a year or so.
I just wanna point out that you have a ton of overlap in your profile. Quicksilver, unlimited cash rewards, and active cash all kind of fill a similar niche, with quicksilver being no FTF but having less overall cashback.
To parrot what others say, there isn’t really “too many credit cards” assuming you can keep track. Yes, many applications in short periods negatively affects score, but it’s not a big deal unless you want to apply for an auto/home loan sometime soon
Come back and ask when you hit double digits.
Too much velocity will hurt your application succeed rate. The hard inquiries will hurt your score temporarily and will get your auto-rejected by many issuers for certain criteria (google Chase 5/24 Rule for a classic example), Having dozens of cards won’t hurt your score, they’ll eventually help it assuming you don’t miss a payment or max them out.
Yes and no. You want to be careful about too many cards too fast (velocity), as some lenders flag you as risky for doing too much too soon. You also want to watch your average card age; since you are young, your average age is only a year or so, maybe less. Every new card drops that average age, making you less desirable to lenders. You want to build a healthy steady profile- you can def go on sprees at time but need to chill out too. Also chase 5/24 naturally limits a bit too, depending on how dead you think that is now
R/churning
There are people who get several new cards a year just for bonuses. It’s a common tactic. Bonuses are by far the best return for your spend.
I have a little over half a dozen open but people here have a few score and even over 100.
I have benefit cards for perks with occasional swipes like hotel/airline cards.
My daily swipe cards tho are my Amex Gold and it was Fidelity Visa for 2% but I switch to NFCU CashRewards Plus for 2% but better customer service over Elan.
I think 2 daily swipe cards is my main play now since I don’t care too much to maxinize getting 5% on things that are like $500 or less a month. Like my gas I spend maybe $150-$250 a month on it and could get 5% but the difference over my 2% is around $5 and just doesn’t matter to me to use another card anymore.
The only card I’ll add in as a 3rd occasionally is the Chase Freedom Flex for certain rotating categories, because I do value UR points for the occasional Hyatt stay for us.
Don’t go too crazy with new apps, but don’t worry about having too many cards either. I have 30. My wife has 21.
take as many as you can handle and the credit cards are still willing to give you. I have a much longer credit history than you. I have more than 30 cards now. I lost count after I got into the 20s but according to credit karma, I have accounts that are in the 30s. But then again I am an optimiser and have a spread of my accounts, limits, use date, ect.