Paid off one credit card. FICO Score was 740, went to 699! Please advise to get back UP!!?

FICO SCORE 740: 1. First cc at 50% (this cc has highest credit limit, only 4,500.) 2.. Second cc at max.. 3. Third cc at max.. FICO SCORE 699 (the next month): 1. Took out fourth cc to balance transfer one high interest cc above to zero interest cc to pay off cc sooner, all of payment appiled to principal. Thought this was a smart thing to do. 2. So, second cc above now has a zero balance. FICO SCORE drove the next month drastically! HOW DO I RESOLVE THIS QUICKLY? ALL IN GOOD STANDING. PAY DOUBLE THE MIN.. PAY, AND ALWAYS EARLY. Thank you ahead for someone's knowledge & expertis!! Credit card that now has zero balance is oldest credit card of seven years. I did not close account. Income to debt ratio is good. So, this is why I was surprised my score dropped so much when the fourth card was taken out to zero% card to pay off oldest card. This first card was taken out at high interest seven years ago when credit wasn't so good, and they refused to lower interest. Don't know why. But have not closed it though, because it is the oldest one. THANK YOU EVERYONE FOR YOUR KNOWLEDGE AND GREAT ADVICE!!

Public Comments

1. Your score probably went down because you applied for more credit. Your score is based on the age of the debt, your repayment history and the percentage of total debt used. Reduce your balance on the third card, don't apply for more credit and keep your payments up to date. Your score should gradually return. I don't think there is any fast way to do this.
2. I'm not sure if you closed them, or just paid the balance. If you closed them, that brings your score down. If it's zero balance it also brings it down a little because it shows you have credit, but aren't using it. Hence the reason for a credit report. I was told to keep a revolving 50 bucks on each card so you are keeping up with the credit history. I swear though you can never win with the FICO. If you pay you lose and if you don't you lose. I think it's a program that should be looked at and revised. I don't think it's ever changed.
3. Your FICO score is lowered when there are additional creditor inquiries, i.e., when you applied for additional credit cards, inquires about your credit standing were made and these inquiries always lower your score. You can check on your credit report which institutions have recently made inquires on your credit causing it to dip lower. Be patient, providing you do not take out any additional credit cards or apply for additionl loans your credit score will jump back up again in about 2 months, probably higher than the 740 it was at.
4. First, new credit (the card you transfered the old one to that has the 0%) will tank your credit for 6 months to a year. Second, now you have 4 credit cards when you only had 3. Just know that the whole balance transfer thing is BAD! That's usually a sign that the borrower feels that they might be in trouble and are trying "tactics" to dig themselves out - at least that's how lenders will see it. Old credit in good standing that is still active is how you get higher scores. Having balances that are 20-50% of the limit is optimal. Don't go to low because card companies won't be making money off you, but above 50% shows you might be a risk. Anyway. Keep your old lines of credit and make sure they are in good standing (no lates, etc). DO NOT OPEN any more revolving credit. You certainly don't need any more. And just to let you know, you can call all your card companies every so often (6 months to year - or when ever) and ask them to lower your fixed percentage rate. Most of the time they will and it doesn't go against you to ask (unless they say they will have to pull your credit info to see, that will count against you if you have more than 2 inquiries per year). Good luck!
5. Your "potential" went up by opening another cc. To jump it back up. Close one of the accounts. You only need one Visa anyways.
6. well I am not an expert but when you applied for the 4th cc that put a hit on your credit score so it went down. I think that is what happened. Every time you apply for credit no matter what your intention it puts a hit on your FICA score. But I think you did the right thing by getting the card with zero % and transferring so every dime you put on that card went to pay off the principal. Now just put the amount that you were paying on the card you paid off and add it with what you were putting on the second card to get that one paid off. Then take what you were using to pay off the second cc and add it to the 3rd card and get it paid off. don't apply for any more credit for at least 6 months after you pay all the cc's off and your FICA score will get much better! Also something I learned is Don't close out the cc accounts once you pay them off just don't use them. It will hurt your FICA score if you close the accounts. What builds your score is longevity of your credit. Keep access to one good low rate cc for emergencies only. ( shopping isn't one) You are doing good I think. I know it takes no time to rack up the cards but it takes time to pay them off.Good luck!
7. So if I understand you what happened. You had 1 Card at 50% and 2 cards maxed out. You still were able to have a 740 Credit Score. This is a very good score and would still have qualified you for very good rates. You then opened up another credit card. Because of this your score took a hit for the inquiry. You did a transfer of all of your cards to the new card. Did you close out the other accounts, if you did this lowered your available credit so increased your utilization. You may have also lowered your credit age if you closed out your oldest accounts. This again will lower your score. Without knowing exact numbers or situations it is hard to say if this is exactly what happend. You should review the following links. These are from http://www.myfico.com which is the source for the FICO Scores. They will give you a little more information on how they work and what you can do to improve it.
8. well, your credit score is also based on your debt to income ratio. If you have a lot of debt and less income coming in, that's why your credit score would go down. But, it also goes down when a company looks at your credit report. It looks really good when you have a lot of available credit versus being in debt.
9. Credit card balance transfer is a process by which we can transfer our outstanding balances on a credit card (which are generally at high interest rates) to a low interest rate credit card. Balance transfer has some good advantages let us look at a few of them. Balance transfer is one of the best methods to get rid of that credit card debt. When you transfer balances all your outstanding balances are wiped out and transferred to new credit card. Depending on what deal you get on the balance transfers the new interest rates on transferred balances could be 0% or a low rate for a particular period. The ideal situation should be to get all the balances cleared within this low interest rate period. Read more from: http://www.credit-card-gallery.com/credit_card_balance_transfer.html