having lots of credit cards to improve credit rating?

zimsabre

right so my credit score aint too good

expirian 529
callcredit 694
equifax 764

iv applyed for a few cards.. about 6 accepted on 2 so far and waiting for letters on the others but it looks good.
low limits tho, 700-5000

what im using them for is to improve my credit rating but how should i go about it? howmuch do you recon i should spend on each card per month.

im paying them all off in full with DD so i dont want to spend too much on each, ive got about £700 to play with a month on the cards.

think its a good idea? for improving my limits and putting my credit score up?

My goal is about £30-000.00 as in i want to work my way up to beable to get that much on credit cards.. you know why stoozing =] anyways back to the question is having 3-6 "high risk" cards a good idea to improve my credit rating over a year

lisyloo

think its a good idea? for improving my limits

No.
It will all count as "available credit".
To improve this part you'd need to close some down.

If you pay them off on time that will create a good reord, but you don't really need 6 to do that.

You limit will also be related to your income.
So it won't matter how good your credit score is, you won't get higher limits than your income allows.

zimsabre

thanks isyloo

1 question, is there a calculator which could give you rough estimated limits based on your income?

Moggles_2

zimsabre wrote: »

Is there a calculator which could give you rough estimated limits based on your income?

I don't know of one. Though annual income is very important, other factors such as your existing credit limits - available and used - are taken into consideration.

I would have a look at the *Credit Rating* articles on the main site, in particular, Martin's *Manage and Improve your Credit Score* article. This will give you a better idea of how to build a good credit history

the_crunch

So it's bad to have lots of available but unused credit.... is it also bad to have used nearly all of your credit limit? eg: If I had a credit card with an £8K limit with nearly £8k on it and paid the minimum payments every month would this be bad?

emmy05

that wouldnt be bad as youre still making payments and keeping up to date with what youre supposed to pay, although it would be a very good idea to pay alot more than the minimum off each month or that sum is going to take one helluva long time to pay off, and even by paying the minimum it might well end up by you going over the maximum sum allowed

benf90

the_crunch wrote: »

So it's bad to have lots of available but unused credit.... is it also bad to have used nearly all of your credit limit? eg: If I had a credit card with an £8K limit with nearly £8k on it and paid the minimum payments every month would this be bad?

I'm not an expert but I'd say this is when income would probably play a major part in the decision.

£8k can either be a lot or a little when compared to a person's income. There's also so many other factors that could be taken into account that practically make it impossible to say whether an existing £8k debt would be a problem.

Moggles_2

benf90 wrote: »

£8k can either be a lot or a little when compared to a person's income. There's also so many other factors that could be taken into account that practically make it impossible to say whether an existing £8k debt would be a problem.

I agree, but cards which are all maxed out, may signal over-commitment, so generally it's advisable to leave some leeway