Applying for new card - queries

thecornflake

I'm thinking about applying for a new card to transfer my Egg card balance (16.9%) over to. The M&S card looks good with a low lifetime rate, and no BT fee (I've heard these can be counted as a purchase and therefore charged interest at a high rate).

Two things that may affect it -

1) I'm about to close an old current account as I've switched to another bank. Will closing this account increase my chances of being accepted, and if so how long will it take for the fact I've closed it to be picked up in credit searches?

2) We sold our flat and moved to a rented house in May. Obviously not being a homeowner isn't as good, but is there any point in waiting a bit longer, say until we've been there for 6 months or a year?

Generally we've made all our payments on everything recently after some tough times last year with quite a lot of missed payments although no CCJs etc.

exel1966

1. Generally, closing the current account will have no impact whatsoever unless you have an active overdraft attached to it. However the longer you've had a bank account the higher you will be rated so use the dormant account on the application rather than the new one.
2. Being a tenant will not rate you as highly as a home owner but far
more important is that you should be on the electoral role. Are you ?
3. Missed payments will not help your cause at all as this will be visible to any future lender.

All lenders can see exactly how much you owe on cards/overdrafts against any credit limits you have. The more stability you can show, the better your chances of getting cards.