Showerthought: maybe closing old cards isn't always the right move

I was at a hardware store in Phoenix and this guy ahead of me was telling his buddy he closed three old store cards to 'clean up his credit.' My score dropped 40 points when I did that a year ago because my total available credit got cut in half. Everyone says to close stuff you don't use, but that really hurt my average account age too. Has anyone else seen a big hit from closing an old account they weren't using?

3 comments

3 Comments

richard_shah1mo ago

My buddy closed his oldest card and his credit score tanked for the same reason.

the_val7d ago

Ugh, that's so frustrating! It feels like the system is set up to trap you. Like, you're told to keep your finances simple and not have cards you don't use, but then you get hit for closing one. Did your buddy try calling the card company to see if they could switch the account to a different card type instead of closing it? I've heard that sometimes works to keep the history.

sage_grant761mo ago

Oh man, that's the worst. My cousin did that last year, shut down a card she'd had since college just because she never used it. Her score dropped like forty points overnight. It took her months of careful spending on her other cards to even start climbing back up. She said it felt like getting punished for being responsible.