i got a credit card with 50% balance.
i have another one with 8% balance.
they both have the same limits.
i wanna transfer 21% from the 50% card to the 8% card.
so this way i would have 29% on each.
i heard tricks a while ago about using 2 paypal accounts, but now they charge a fee for accepting cc payment.
how can this be done without pulling out cash, or paying stupid fees?
thanks.
Use the 8% credit card to make a payment totalling the necessary amount to bring the card currently at 50% down to 29%. In turn this will raise the percentage from 8% to… ?
The only way your logic will work is if both cards have the exact same limit. If they do, then the afore mentioned scenario will bring both cards to 29%.
If they arent the same… well… then this happens.
Say the 50% card has a $20,000 limit ($10,000 balance) and the 8% card has a $10,000 limit ($800 balance)
The amount necessary to bring the 50% card down to 29% amounts to $4200, leaving that card at the desired 29% balance of $5800.
However, that now adds $4200 to the balance of (what was) the 8% card with the $10,000 limit, bringing the balance to $5000, exactly 50% of the limit.
The numbers and percentages will vary with different limits, but the point is your logic will only work if the limits are the same, and hopefully they are.
thanks for the reply. yes, i said the limits were the same.
so you are saying i can just pay the balance on one card using another card for no extra fee? i never thought of that. i’ve been always paying the balances from my bank account.
how do i make a payment to a cc balance using another cc?
You can usually do so over the phone with them or via their website.
I had a brainfart, missed the statement about the same limits.
This brings up a question I’ve had for a very long time:
For credit/FICO’s sake, is it best to have credit card balances as low as possible as an aggregate of all your cards relating to the limits of all cards added together, or the lowest percentage relating to the limit of each individual card?
example:
card 1- 25k limit, 0 balance
card 2-10k limit, 0 balance
card 3-8k limit, 7k balance
card 4-8k limit 7k balance
card 5-8k limit, 6k balance
=33.8% of credit used
or split the balances so
card 1-8k balance, 32%
card 2-4k balance, 40
card 3-2k balance, 25
card 4-3k balance, 37.5
card 5-3k balance, 37.5
=34.4% average credit used
I ask because I’m temporarily in a situation where I’m carrying balances on my cards(not the scenario above, but similar) and the rates are lower on cards that have lower limits, so I have balances on those, and none on the higher limit cards, and figured it would average -out. Is that not the case? Is it on a card-by-card basis? The balances appeared a few months ago, and will be totally gone in a few months, so I may not worry about transferrng them at this point, but it would be great to know for the future. Anything to jack up my FICO score, or at least prevent it from dropping.
Thanks!
Michael
To get your score as high as you can the balances need to be as low compared to your limits as possible. One thing though is that once the balance to limit ratio reaches 30% the bang for the buck goes down drastically (around 660). You can pay down more but you don’t get a lot of movement for the amount of money you have out. For me I would rather use those funds some place else. To get the higher points (690 and above) you need larger limits and older accounts. You also need different kinds of accounts. If you can get a bank loan, that will get you into the 700s. That configuration looks like total limits over $40,000, balances all 30% and under at lease 2 mortgages and a bank loan. You will be over 700.
I understand I should keep the balances under 30% of the limits for optimum scorage, but should that be the sum of all balances of open accounts collectively vs. the total of all limits on open accounts, or each individual card/account?
I was under the impression as long as the balances added together are less than 30% of all limits, as a whole, it’s fine, but I’m worried that since some cards are near the limit, it’ll adversely effect my score, even though I have several cards with very high limits and a balance of $0.
if u max a card out, its bad for your credit score…
when i had a few cards at 80% and my score went down bigtime… like over 50-70 points… even when i had a bunch of other cards with zero balance.
now i’m spreading the balances to all cards… this is why i asked the question on the beginning of this post.
now i’m slowly paying them all off… i’m down at 40% on each one… but my aim is below 30%… that will fix the score hopefully…
MOON,
how does the 2 mortgages or a good loan effect the score? i dont understand that part. can u explain it please?
Not a good loan a bank loan. Different types of loans give you more points. The lowest is payday loans the highest is a bank loan. You know when you go into a bank and ask for a loan based on your signiture. Those are hard to get and have the highest point value. You need a large varity of types of credit.
so if i get a loan, a mortgage loan or a HELOC, my score gets higher?
What the FICO score is intended to indicate is how well you manage credit. The higher scores come from people that have successfully managed complicated credit portfolios. The harder it is to get a type of loan the higher the score will go. There are 2 ratios that get looked at the percent of each line of credit’s balance to its own limit and your total borrowing power or the total of all your limits versus your total balances. Second mortgages tend to add hundreds of thousands of dollars to that equation but that type of loan is a higher value loan. That tends to drive the score up. As for bank loans, they are difficult to get. The easiest way to get one is to wait to the time between Thanksgiving and Christmas when you receive in the mail these checks for a couple of thousand dollars from a bank that if you deposit it you have a loan for that amount. Finance companies and credit card companies send them out a lot, but every now and then it will be from a bank. When it comes from the bank, you want to deposit it. Use the funds from it to pay it off and watch your score rise.