The person made a very very very bad pun. I replied with sarcasm so obvious that it didn’t need an /s tag.

That said, I admire your desire to be helpful.

I don’t get it

Well lookie who we have here… Mr Moneybags.

Nothing wrong with having 3 cards, in fact that seems to be the sweet spot. Closing cards is never good so you don’t want to just go around willy nilly opening up cards.

You are absolutely right in that you have to use it to have a good score, but you have to use it wisely. Maintain a low balance, don’t allow cards to go dormant, keep requesting increases to available credit every 6 months so that your utilization will be minimized, and diversify your portfolio with three cards, and at least one line of credit that you never use, and a revolving account like a car or home once you are ready. Sounds like you figured out their formula, congrats on the 800+.

I was 812 until I bought a house, and that knocked me down to 760. Everything I read indicates that It will take at least 5 years of making extra payments on my house for me to get back to 800+, not that it really matters because the only reason I needed a high score in the first place was to get the house.

If your total utilization is greater than 10%, or if you have a high balance carried over multiple months, your score will decrease. It will be a few months after the balance is paid in full and you utilization is reduced to below 10% that your score will recover. Then you are stuck with that card because if you ever close it, you will take another hit.

Opening a credit account is a commitment and shouldn’t be done just to get an interest free period on an appliance. You will be hit with a hard inquiry when you open the card, and will be hit if you ever close the card. An interest free period is not really a great sign-on bonus anyway because if you take them up on that, you will see a temporary hit to your score.

If you spend thousands a year at Home Depot (like a contractor or handyman) then a Home Depot card makes sense. I spend a lot at Costco so the Costco card makes sense, also the Amazon prime card makes sense for me because I shop at Whole Foods a lot.

A credit card should be paid off in full soon after you make the purchase. Get your points / cash back / etc and never allow a balance to hit the statement. The real value of the card is in the points/cash back.

I hope this is satire… because that’s not how you are supposed to use credit cards if you want to have a good credit score.

Interest or not, you should never carry a balance on a credit card. You should also never have more than 10% utilization.

Looks like you probably did three things which hurt your score… having a new account, carrying a balance, and possibly having more than 10% utilization.

I know the whole credit score thing seems stupid, but if you know how their calculations work you can get a high score in just a few years of doing everything correctly.