Hot take: I stopped paying my whole statement balance and my score jumped 30 points

For years I paid off every single dollar on my two cards. My score was stuck at 720. Last January, I started leaving a small balance, like $20, on one card when the statement closed. In three months, my FICO hit 750. My friend, who works at a bank, said showing a tiny bit of 'credit use' looks better than zero to the scoring model. Has anyone else seen this work, or did I just get lucky?

3 comments

3 Comments

xena_bailey183d ago

So you only leave a small balance on one card, not both? I've always paid both to zero. Did your friend say if it matters which card you do it on, like the older one or the one with a higher limit? I'm trying to figure out if I should try this with my main card or my backup one.

willowg883d ago

Honestly my cousin tried that trick with her oldest card and it totally backfired. She left like 30 bucks on it for months and her score actually dipped a little. The whole thing seems super random to me, like it depends on your bank or something. I just pay everything off now because I got tired of trying to game the system.

king.val3d ago

Wait, really? I did the same thing last year and my score finally moved after being stuck forever.