Credit Card question

One year ago I got a secured credit card through Capitol One. It was my first credit card ever. Early last month I applied for a new credit card and was denied. I have a credit score of about 670 according to my application that was denied. Here is the comments for my denial:

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Key factors that adversely affected your credit score:
Too few accounts currently paid as agreed
Length of time accounts have been established
Proportion of balances to credit limits on revolving accounts is too high
Lack of recent installment loan information
Too many inquiries last 12 months

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My credit history is ~12 months old

Hey, go get a signature loan for $400 from a credit union. Do it for 1 year.

If you applied for several credit cards just 6 months ago, I would wait a while. After 2 years all of those inquiries will drop off of your credit report and that will help you. Also, before you apply for a new card pay off your current card BEFORE the statement comes out. This will allow you to show 0% utilization, which will drastically improve your credit score if you are using over 30% of your credit limit each month.

You can use CreditKarma.com to get a better idea of what your credit score looks like and how certain factors influence it. It's free, safe, and provides fairly accurate credit score estimates.

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Too few accounts currently paid as agreed

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Not sure

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Length of time accounts have been established

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Same issue you are experiencing. Information about my credit history is 6-12 months old.

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Proportion of balances to credit limits on revolving accounts is too high

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This is my fault. One poster in this thread hinted at how to resolve this problem. I was keeping too high of a balance on my monthly statement instead of keeping it within 0-20%. It wasn't even necessary for me to keep a high balance since I could pay it off no problem.

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Lack of recent installment loan information

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Not sure about this one

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Too many inquiries last 12 months

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This one is for doing exactly what you are doing, applying for several credit cards and continually getting denied.

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did you pay the accounts off too early and not spend enough?

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I was at one point registering every purchase on my credit card, and immediately paying it off when the balance registered on my account. The problem was I did not monitor this balance appropriately during the week when they log your balance for your monthly statement. I've since swapped to balancing my purchases between my debit and credit card. When I swipe my debit, I usually select credit, in order to delay the hold on my account for a few days.

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I've been using it for the past 6 months spending around $1,000 per month on it and paying it off each month, my question is how long will it be before my credit score rises and I can get a better card if I'm spending around $1,000 each month and paying it off each month?

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FICO Score Breakdown

• 35 % Debt History (What is your track record?)
• 30 % Debt Level (How much is too much?)
• 15 % Length of Time You Have Been in Debt (How established is yours?)
• 10 % New Debt (Are you taking on more new debt?)
• 10 % Types of Debt in Use (Is it a healthy mix?)

Your FICO score can change whenever your credit report changes. But your score probably won’t change a lot from one month to the next. In a given three-month time period, only about one in four people has a 20 point change in their FICO score.