How long should I wait to do a credit check?

[thawolfman]

Just paid off one of my credit card bills that was around ~1100 and called up to close the account. While talking to the guy it showed that I had three different accounts that were still open, most likely after changing to a new card or whatever, but I had him close all three down.

I also had a Capital One account closed down that I had yet to even activate.

At this point in time I really have no reason to get a credit check (loan, etc) but I'm curious to find out what my score/rating is anyways.

So my question is - since I just closed the accounts should I wait a month or so before getting a credit check to make sure that they are no longer under my name, or should something like that take effect immediately?

Thanks,

-Ben-

 

[amdforever2]

Closing the accounts will provide a hit to your score, if they were some of your older accounts.

Regardless, they'll still appear on your credit reports as closed by consumer accounts

 

[thawolfman]

Interesting.

So I was better off paying off the card and letting it sit unused?

 

[amdforever2]

Yep. Shoulda left it open, and just used it once a year for gas, providing there was no annual fee.

Say you have two accounts

Capital One that you closed is 10 years old
Other card is one year old

your average age is 5 years of credit history


if you close the older account, your average age goes down
bad for your score



also

lets say you have capital one open with $5k available
card 2 is open with 1k available

you have a total of $500 in balances


with 6K available, thats not a problem
with just 1k available, suddenly you're using 50% of your credit

 

[thawolfman]

I see I see. I wasn't aware of how that worked before I went and did this. Suppose I should have done my research BEFORE!

Although the person I was on the phone with @ MBNA said that I could have the account reopened within 6 months without a credit check, or something to that effect, but I'd imagine that that would reset my time with that card...

 

[kyparrish]

doh!

 

[amdforever2]

Originally posted by: thawolfman
I see I see. I wasn't aware of how that worked before I went and did this. Suppose I should have done my research BEFORE!

Although the person I was on the phone with @ MBNA said that I could have the account reopened within 6 months without a credit check, or something to that effect, but I'd imagine that that would reset my time with that card...

nope

if you reopen the account, and the account number stays the same, the history is not reset

it would be as if you never closed it

as long as the account number stays the same

 

[amdforever2]

oh, and the road works both ways

if this account you closed was only 2 months old, while you have multiple other accounts that are years old, you aren't really hurting yourself, except by cutting your debt/limit ratio

still, the account will remain on your credit report, with payment history intact, showing closed by consumer

 

[boyRacer]

Originally posted by: amdforever2
if you reopen the account, and the account number stays the same, the history is not reset

it would be as if you never closed it

as long as the account number stays the same

what about for people who lost their credit cards and needed new acct #s?

 

[amdforever2]

Originally posted by: bR

Originally posted by: amdforever2
if you reopen the account, and the account number stays the same, the history is not reset

it would be as if you never closed it

as long as the account number stays the same

what about for people who lost their credit cards and needed new acct #s?

In that case, sometimes the bank just removes the "closed" account and reports the "new" one with all the history, sometimes the bank reports the "old" one as closed, and creates a new one with the same opening date of the "closed" one, and sometimes they report the first one closed, and create a whole new one, with brand new history.

 

[boyRacer]

Originally posted by: amdforever2

Originally posted by: bR

Originally posted by: amdforever2
if you reopen the account, and the account number stays the same, the history is not reset

it would be as if you never closed it

as long as the account number stays the same

what about for people who lost their credit cards and needed new acct #s?

In that case, sometimes the bank just removes the "closed" account and reports the "new" one with all the history, sometimes the bank reports the "old" one as closed, and creates a new one with the same opening date of the "closed" one, and sometimes they report the first one closed, and create a whole new one, with brand new history.

sucks for the latter.

 

[amdforever2]

yeah

another thing to watch out for is companies not reporting credit limit, only high balance


for example

your capital one may have a 10K limit

but the most you ever charged was $100

so


capital one reports credit limit N/A, high balance $100

since the FICO scoring cant find a limit, it works off of high balance

if you have a $50 balance on that capital one, and its high balance is $100, and capital one does not report credit limit, bam, you're at 50% utilization on one of your cards


capital one is notorious for this