Husband & Wife Stoozers?

WallyMan

I'm in the process of borrowing on a couple of credit cards at 0% to use against our offset mortgage. One thought crossed my mind. Does anyone know if one persons credit rating can be impacted by another person applying for credit at the same address? I understand the need to not apply for too many credit card applications in case this adversely impacts my rating. So can our household mitigate this by my wife applying for a couple of cards in her name? ie can we spread the risk of affecting my rating?

Martinslovechild

This is exactly what myself & my wife do. As you say, it limits the risk of one person applying for too much credit and also increases the possibilities of how much stooz can be built up.

As it now stands, our entire mortgage is on 0% ;D ;D. After April, I need to start moving some credit around as a couple of deals expire but it will have been at least 5 months since the last application so this won't be a problem.

Make sure that you close down credit cards as you go though (unless you've phoned them up and they'll offer you further 0% credit!!) - I recently found that the amount of credit available to me was over £100K!!!! I've now closed some of the cards to hopefully maximise the amount of credit i'll be offered in 4 months time.

40079

MLC- does your wife work- mine currently doesn't and her credit card success record over the last 2 years is 1 hit (credit limit £8k) and 2 misses (credit limits of £500 and £350!)

This was all on cards where household income was supposedly taken into account. I normally get between £10k and £15k limits when I apply in my own name

Martinslovechild

MLC- does your wife work?

Yes, she does. She earns a pretty good wage too, which helps the stoozing cause no end!!

WallyMan

MLC - Can I enquire as to how many cards you each have? I'm new to this game and have seen conflicting comments as to whether you should stick with 2 or 3 cards or perhaps can apply with a lot more without affecting your credit rating

Martinslovechild

Wally,

I currently have 8.  Of these, I use:-
 - 1 (cashback card) for regular monthly spending
 - 3 about to close down, my old regular spending card and 2 cards where 0% has just expired
 - 4 currently maxed out, money sitting in flexi mortgage

Mrs MLC has :-
 - 1 (cashback card) for regular monthly spending
 - 4 0% cards, all maxed out, money sitting in flexi mortgage

I recently checked out the total amount of credit available to me personally and was astonished to find that it's over £100K!!.  I was pretty shocked to say the least and am therefore now trying to reduce this down to something around the £50K mark as I need to start applying for new 0% cards in 4 months.  Once the 3 cards have been cancelled, my available credit will be back down to a more realistic £55,000.  However, In 4 months time, this will probably go back up to £80K-£90K as I look to move a large proportion of the stooz pot around.

smartsaver

As it now stands, our entire mortgage is on 0% ;D ;D.  

I take my (our) hat off to you this is now our aim. We will need to have 88k stoozed which at one time we had. The offers have dried up abit recently, maybe due to an error by LloydsTSB, although we still have a fairly respectable 55k stoozed.

MBNA refused a new 0% deal so we have applied for a virgin card and hope to transfer the the very decent £18.300 credit limit over. Seems a shame to cancel and waste it.  ::)

Here's to an interest free mortgage future to us all!  8) Wish we'd done this years ago.