Should I start churning at a young-ish age?
 

I'm in my early/mid-20s with a good full-time job and a 740 on CreditKarma. My credit history started about 4-5 years ago.

If I start churning, I'll jump from 3 open accounts to 6, and it'll halve my "average age of open accounts" from 2.5 years to 1.25 years. I owned my closed accounts for about 1 year each.

Is it really okay for me to churn every 90 days? I figure a high percentage of cards I'd be applying for would be cards I'll cancel within the year due to annual fees.

You may better start your first churn now. But your second churn should be at least 6 month apart.

That makes sense I guess. Are 3 cards with the different credit bureaus okay? Or should I just limit myself to 2? 1?

I should have also pointed out that I got denied for the Ink Bold due to not having a long average (business?) credit history

Finally, how does churning affect stuff like applying for housing loans?

Agreed, eventually you can get on a 90 day cycle but I would wait at least a couple of years. Most of the people that are on 90 app cycles have 10+ years of credit history, and they also have a solid base of cards that stay open to help with their AAoA.

Saw your post after I posted, you need to shut down credit apps about a year before a mortgage app.

If your parents have good credit get them to add you as an authorized user on their oldest account. It will eventually show up on your credit report and can dramatically increase the average age of your accounts. My oldest account on file is older than me.

I am actually just going for a condo loan but I'm assuming they're treated the same... Dang it!! I've been reading travel blogs for almost a year now but only 70k UR points to show for it... I'm so jealous of all the points I could potentially be missing from CC sign-ups!!!

I sorta got my parents into miles & points when I got my dad to sign up for the Ink Bold (and add me as an authorized user). So with the IB, my average age of accounts is actually going to go down? hahaha.....:(

I still would like to know how many cards I should apply for in this upcoming churn (I'll stop after this one)

If you're in the middle of the mortgage process, I would not apply for anything. New inquiries, especially credit products will come under a lot of scrutiny by the underwriting office. They will want to know why exactly you need all of this unsecured credit when you're about to get a mortgage.

I think you would be ok to apply for cards. You just need to be a little bit more patient. How about one card every 3 months? And start with cards you think you'll keep (either no fee or low fee and worth the cost) that way over time you can let the earlier cards age and show issuers you aren't just a churner. For example I'd start with SPG Amex with only $65 fee, you can keep that one for years. There are rumors the bonus on that card will be going up 30k pretty soon. Then in a few months if the Freedom card bonus comes back up take that one. Not huge bonuses, but cards you can keep. Then in a few more months move on to some other cards.

Also, how much card apps impact mortgage apps is somewhat of an open question. There are a few threads here discussing this.

For someone with a 4 year credit history and only 3 open accounts it will be more of a problem than someone who has a 10+ year credit history. I agree with mixing in a few bonuses such as the SPG and Freedom cards but you need a solid 3-4 cards that can age together for credit reporting purposes. Which also brings up the question, OP, are your 3 open accounts credit cards? Or other loans?

I'm not applying for a loan for my condo until late 2013 so presumably I can do a churn.

Applying for 1 card (or 2? haha) that I'll keep permanently sounds like a good idea but I'm not sure which one. I thought about SPG and its 30k bonus but I'm very satisfied with my Chase Sapphire Preferred and I'm not sure if I can justify paying two annual fees. Freedom is a free card but has a really weak sign-up bonus.

My 3 open credit cards are a 2% cashback card (2008), Amex Blue (2008) and CSP (2011). I do the whole 5x thing with dad's ink bold + prepaid cc. I've never had a loan

Having that Amex blue changes things, Amex is the only company that backdates new accounts to your original membership year. For example, an account open August 2012 would backdate to August 2008 not showing up as a new account. It would also assist with keeping your AAoA above 2 years.

If you're not applying for a mortgage until late 2013 you can do 2-3 now and 2-3 at the beginning of 2013. Try the US Airways Barclays card, it gives 10k miles for each year you have the card, essentially canceling out the AF. You could also go after the AA citi cards, which in all likelihood you could probably get a statement credit or AF waived each year. Make sure you find the links for these apps around here instead of using lesser offers.

I agree with SPG, because of the AMEX backdating. You may also consider AMEX HHonor which has 50k bonus, and no AF. You may get an upgrade offer for Surpass with some extra bonus.

oh really.....so I should apply for only amex cards? What if I get an amex and then cancel later (citi aa amex? Boa virgin America amex?). Maybe Hilton amex makes sense but I would much rather have miles than hotel points. Spg is so tempting right now (aka with a 30k offer) and maybe even Barclay, assuming it's a diff credit agency

Backdating only works with actual American Express cards, not amex network cards (Citi, BOA, etc.).

I would probably do Barclays (will pull transunion most likely), SPG (will pull experian), and both AA cards (credit pull depends on where you live). That will likely result in only 3 inquires for 4 cards but the backdating Amex will help offset your AAoA ding. You will also have your inquiries spread out across 2 or 3 agencies.

From what I've read, a credit score of 740 and above is considered excellent. However, I learned recently that a score of 770 and above gets an even better rate.

For example, 770+ is 4.00 for a 30-year while anything below 770 is 4.18. Of course, I only found this out after I applied for a credit card and my score dipped below 770! For the amount I'm borrowing, that amounts to a six-figure difference in interest over the life of the loan...all for applying for CCs I could have waited on. Something to keep in mind...