I had a pretty crazy experience and I find this hard to explain. My wife doesn't have SSN and she recently got a BoA card with ITIN using household income. Last week, she got a pre-approved offer in the mail for Amex Gold 25k points. I thought I'd try and I was surprised to see an approval using ITIN. We don't even have Amex CCs, only prepaid cards (bluebird and target). I don't know how she got targeted. So she is now building history with Amex and I'm hoping she gets approved for other cards in a year or so. I don't know how this happened. I am going to try and see if I can get a a basic or secured card approved with all major issuers (chase, citi, barclays, us bank).