Can an installment loan affect my credit score if I use it to pay down revolving credit card balances?

Question

We are currently planning on purchasing a house and another car. I pulled my credit scores and am currently sitting at 665 671 and 687. I have about 20k in debt with 8k on my car and the remainder on revolving and installment accounts. Also a majority of my credit cards balances are pretty high. I recently got a new card and did a balance transfer from one card to a new 4.99% maxing out the new card but the new balance has not yet appeared online affecting my score. In three months I will be able to pay my credit card balances down to about 30% of their limits. I was wondering if I took out an installment loan and paid down my balances now to 30% then pay off the loan in three months would that be better or worse than waiting the 3 months and pay then? I'm looking for the best solution to preserve and increase my scores.

Answer 1

Since you already have some installment loans it probably won't help or not much. Keeping your revolving balances low might help some but raising your installment loans will hurt so it may be a wash. Avoid buying a house until you get out of debt then don't buy a car for a long time if you can wait.

Answer 2

Credit card debt consolidation comes as a great relief to all those who are plagued by multiple credit card debts. If new to credit card debt consolidation, all it does is to club up all your debts from multiple credit cards into single more manageable and easy to repay debt, which helps the credit card holder tremendously. Credit card debt consolidation has many benefits but the four listed below are typically more popular. If you are waiting to get rid of your multiple credit card debt, credit card debt consolidation might be the panacea for you. Here are the four great reasons.

To reduce the debt burden

This is the first and foremost reason of credit card debt consolidation. Too many credit cards, multiple credit card debts, varying repayment dates- all become too overwhelming , can rupture your financial well being and and impose a lot of burden. Credit card debt consolidation eases all this complexity and all your debts become one single entity and are now easier to repay.
The first, as we just mentioned, is because your current credit card or cards are costing you far too much in annual fee or APR.

Save on annual fee

If all your credit cards have some annual fee, these numbers add up quickly and can appear quite a sum. When you consolidate your credit card debt you also get rid of all these multiple annual fees and might end up saving a lot of money.

Prevent your credit ratings from getting worse

If your existing credit card debt repayment burden is causing too many repayment defaults and as a result your credit rating is getting quite a beating, credit card debt consolidation will bring welcome relief. It will salvage your credit history and prevent any further damage due to all those nagging credit cards. Read more from: http://www.credit-card-gallery.com/article/397,Four_tempting_reasons_to_credit_card_debt_consolidation