How Many Inquiries Is Too Many?

Hey Everyone!

Hope you are all having a great week. I have spent the past few days reading and viewing various blogs and forums about credit and credit cards.

I found one guy who was asking a question about credit cards that I thought I would answer here. He was saying that he had a credit card already and wanted to apply for another one or two and how it would affect his credit score if he applied for more than one offer.

He said he had a credit score of about 700-715 which is actually a decent score. He was asking if he applied for several cards, if I recall correctly was like 10 offers, would this affect his score much.

If he was applying for a mortgage or an auto loan, he could apply for more than one finance company and only be dinged with one inquiry during a fourteen day period. With credit card offers, this rule does not apply!

If he applies for more than one offer or application, he will get dinged for each one he submits. Thus, getting several inquiries on his credit file which will bring down his FICO scores tremendously.

If he really needs another card, he should only apply for the one that has the best offer for his personal budget and circumstances. With a score as high as he has, he should not have a problem applying and getting approved for another card.

If he was to apply for all the offers he was talking about, each inquiry would show up almost instantly on his credit reports. Especially, if he applied online with the various banks or finance companies. This would bring his scores down a lot.

My advice to anyone wanting to do something like that, is not to even attempt it at all. We all want to be improving our FICO scores as much as possible and not bringing them down. Since most banks and other institutions use these scores to evaluate us as to whether we can afford something or not and whether we get approved or not.

If you have any issues or concerns you would like me to address here on my blog, just let me know.

Till next time,

Michael