Opening New Lines of Credit and FICO?

Question

Long story short. I just applied and received 4 credit cards and 1 Circuit City Card. They are lower limits with the highest being 1500 and the lowest being 500. My question is about this affecting my FICO score. I know inquiries hurt but only 2 of these were a hard pulls. I am just wondering if when these all start reporting to the credit bureau if it will drop my score alot? I have no balance on any of them if that helps.


Thanks

Answer 1

How it would affect your FICO's depends on what you have on your credit reports right now.

If you have a good balance of cards and loans that are in good standing with a fairly long history on most or all, you might see a small blip on your scores when the 4 cards start reporting.

If you don't have many cards and loans, short history, etc. you will probably see more of a score loss.

But whatever drop you have probably won't last long. You should see it start to rise in 4 to 6 months and, depending on what you have on your reports right now, in 6/8 months to a year your scores should be higher than they are now - as long as you take care of your credit.

You got lucky in only having two hards pulled.