How many credit cards should I keep open?

chelseablue

Im a bit confused as to whether I should keep my credit card accounts open or close them?

I have the following cards:

Halifax: Credit limit £6,200 Balance £0

Nationwide: Credit limit £2,000 Balance £0

Barclaycard: Credit limit £7,180 Balance £284

Should I close 2 and just keep 1? Or still keep 3 open?
Is it good or bad for your credit rating to have cards that you dont use?

Thank you

InsideInsurance

If you search this question is asked and answered at least a few times a week.

What are you actually trying to achieve?

If you are wanting to maximise your credit rating then there is no right answer because every lender has their own criteria and there is conflicting variables.

Lots of credit, great, others trust you, if its a few lines with high limits then thats even better than if it was a lot of lines with small limits each. On the flipside though, could you afford more credit if you were to max out all of your lines/ cards tomorrow?

CLAPTON

chelseablue wrote: »

Im a bit confused as to whether I should keep my credit card accounts open or close them?

I have the following cards:

Halifax: Credit limit £6,200 Balance £0

Nationwide: Credit limit £2,000 Balance £0

Barclaycard: Credit limit £7,180 Balance £284

Should I close 2 and just keep 1? Or still keep 3 open?
Is it good or bad for your credit rating to have cards that you dont use?

Thank you

depends

do you ever travel abroad
ever hire a car
ever book a hotel room
ever shop anywhere
like free money or discounts


if so CC can be useful and some make you a little money

but it's pretty pointless holding CC you don't use: eventually the banks will probably close them

Paully232000

chelseablue wrote: »

Im a bit confused as to whether I should keep my credit card accounts open or close them?

I have the following cards:

Halifax: Credit limit £6,200 Balance £0

Nationwide: Credit limit £2,000 Balance £0

Barclaycard: Credit limit £7,180 Balance £284

Should I close 2 and just keep 1? Or still keep 3 open?
Is it good or bad for your credit rating to have cards that you dont use?

Thank you

I would always keep at least 2 open, for nothing more than one of them may have issues as we have seen in the past with various banks and not being able to use the cards. Or one gets blocked by the bank, even without reason.

The only reason you may want to close one of them is that some people believe that you have more difficulties getting more credit facilities when your limits reach 50% of your income. So if you believe that, and your income is less than 30K, maybe a good idea to close one of them.