Credit Card Mix

Hello all,

I stupidly closed a long standing credit card and dropped my credit score - not terribly I am now a 700 but I’m sure it will go back quickly. I am now looking for a good mix of cards. I use credit cards mostly for the accumulating points or getting cash back. I do not carry a balance that accumulates interest. I pay the bill prior to this. I do not travel for work. I probably spend anywhere from $30,000 - $50,000 per year eligible for card purchases. I do buy things on amazon. I am mainly interested in good cash back cards, an amazon card, and of course a gas card.

Currently:

Capital One Venture card - I took advantage of the 50,000 miles deal and now have around 70,000 miles to spend. The first annual fee was waived but it is $95 when the next year starts up. I am thinking about getting rid of the card when this occurs if the company will not waive the fee. 2x miles on every purchase and 1:1 miles transfer. I’ve heard a lot about how miles aren’t always worth it due to airlines dilution and the hoops one must jump through to redeem.

Seriously thinking of adding:

Amazon Prime Rewards Visa Signature Card - no annual fee and 5% back on amazon purchases - this would be used only for amazon purchases.

Discover it Cash Back - no annual fee and 5% on rotating categories - I don’t mind keeping track of the categories - I would use this when I can get the 5% back then move to the Citi Double Cash Card

Bank of America® Cash Rewards credit card - 3% cash back on gas up to $2500 per quarter (should be fine with that), you can get an additional 10 percent customer rewards bonus when you redeem your rewards into your active Bank of America checking or savings account. So this would be used when the discover is not in rotation.

Citi® Double Cash Card - no annual fee and 2% on everything with no limits - this would be my fall back card and the card to replace the Capital One Venture card if I end up canceling.

These are the 4 cards I’d like to keep as my main “squeeze” and possibly get out of the Venture card. I feel like no AF is really the way to go. Does anyone feel getting a miles card is worth it especially when I only really travel 1-2 times per year for business and 1-2 per year for vacation? Thanks in advance for the remarks! Will applying for all these cards at once cause issues on my credit?

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This is a good card if you can obtain one. You will get a 3% reward the first year.:

Alliant Visa Signature

Likewise, the Discover It Miles card will also net you a 3% reward the first year.

Discover It Miles card

I agree the Citi Doublecash card, at a 2% reward, is worth acquiring.

The NFCU Flagship card is a great CC provided you limit yourself to conventional spend. NFCU is sensitive as hell regarding unconventional spending on the card:

NFCU Flagship Rewards

The B of A Cash Rewards card, also known as the “1-2-3 card”, is a good card I guess for gasoline. But with only 2% on groceries you might want to consider the AMEX blue cash everyday card which offers 3% on groceries:

Get 3% reward here on groceries

In addition to the above, PayPal and PenFed offer credit cards which will reward you at a 2% rate across the board.

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I am trying to look for a card without annual fees - Alliant Visa has a $59 annual fee.
The NFCU flagship is another card with an annual fee.
AMEX is 3% for the 1st year than 1% after that. I really don’t want to cancel cards year to year.

If you are planning to optimize rewards cards, you should make your first several cards Chase. That’s because they are very strict with their 5/24 rule (no more than 5 new cards from anybody in the last 24 months), and other issuers are less so. Makes sense to blow your wad of 5 with Chase before pursuing others.

Often AF are waived the first year. Often AF cards can be product changed after the first year to a no fee version which allows you to keep the credit and age of credit without cost, even if it is a stinker card otherwise.

Best thing you can do is go to Reddit and look at the /churning sub. There is a pinned post there that is a flow chart of recommended cards. There is also a daily thread there where you can post your details and get recommendations from others. Follow the guidelines for what info you need to post to get good recommendations. Another good source is creditcardtuneup.com. I do also like magnifymoney.com for its ability to sort by bonus rewards (Personally, I seek sign-up bonuses as much as ongoing rewards).

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Most likely your score did not drop because you closed an old card, but because this reduced your available credit (and increased debt to credit ratio). Closed accounts in good standing remain on your report and count towards the FICO score for about 10 years. You can bring the score back up to your maximum possible by pre-paying all your credit cards to $0 before their statement closing dates.

But it also gives 3% cash back for the first year and 2.5% after that on everything, so if you spend more than $11800 per year on “everything else” (besides Amazon, gasoline, groceries), it’ll be better than Citi DoubleCash. You can also make up for the annual fee by using the card to pay for things you normally wouldn’t because of fees, like income taxes.

No. You can churn the miles cards just for the signup bonuses and to accumulate miles, but otherwise the cards are not worth it. Besides, all the good ones have annual fees. Dollar for dollar, the mile rewards are rarely worth more than 2% cash back unless you redeem for first class or business, but dollar for dollar you are still spending more to be fancy.

In case you didn’t see it, we have a thread for Best Reward / Cash Back Credit Cards.

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The Chase AARP is 3% on gas and restaurants - has been a good card for me. I use the Chase Freedom card for the rotating 5% categories and the Fidelity 2% card for everything else.

I’d add the Chase Freedom for more 5% categories for OP’s mix.

If you fly a few times per year, it could be worth it but stick with sign-up bonuses for the most part. Only exception is always having one of those airline mile cards if traveling abroad since all the ones listed by OP have a 3% foreign transaction fee (aside from Discover but good luck using it abroad lol) and those airline miles cards usually have no foreign transaction fees.

Played well the miles credit card can surpass any signup bonus you can find elsewhere. Doing 4 offers last year between me and DH, we’re flying to Europe next summer on free economy return tickets which make each sign-up bonus worth ~$1400 for $3k spends. You could make them worth more flying business class but it’d take a lot more offers to fly all of us.

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