I was just now watching Brian Williams and he said that the average American has 9 credit cards. I thought it must be 4-5 - we have 2 credit cards with a good spending limit. How many do you have???

I am searching for the link which states this - will find and post asap.

Edited to add: The link is MSNBC - MSNBC - Breaking World News and US News Stories & Headlines - Get the Latest Business, Health, Entertainment, Sports, & Technology updates from around the world Front Page - click on the "digging out of credit card debt" video.

Cynthia

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And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Phil:4:7

Well, when I got my first credit card (a $500 limit) I maxed it out. I've decided that I don't want to get another one until I finish college. From that point on I plan on keeping it only for emergencies (such as a tire blowing out and getting towed to a station). So, to answer your q I have none, just my trusty debit card.

Wow!! Here I was thinking we are above average, guess I was wrong!!! We have 4. A Visa, A mastercard, a discover and a Lowe's. We do not use the Mastercard or Lowes and are hoping to pay them off soon and do away with them.

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~Happiness is a large family~

We only have 2 major cards and 2 or 3 store cards - I can't remember because we opened them only to pay off big purchases with no interest (furniture, appliances, etc) and paid them off within the year with no interest. I guess they are technically credit cards, but not the kind we use or carry around. I read that it damages your credit score to cancel credit cards, so we just keep them locked up with the important papers.

I believe it - I am always stunned when people open their wallets and there are tons of cards. Some people have one for every store they shop at, plus the visa, mastercard, amex, etc.. How confusing would bill paying be with that many cards?

We have 1 a piece with a 500 limit that we pay off every month. Lately we have been getting on average 2 to 3 apps in the mail and I just pitch them. We dont want them nor need them. If we cant pay cash we do not need it.

At One time I Used to Kind of Collect Credit cards I would always Open an account at a Store to Save that 20 % On My Purchase.

I can't Remember them all but I Had - Disney store, Bon ton , Lerner NY, Limited , Express , JcPenny , Sears , Bradleees, Strawbridge and Clothier , Hess Dept Store, Boscovs, Texaco , Hechingers , Circuit City , Best Buy , Kmart , Toys R Us Visa , Mastercard - No I Didn't Have balances on all of them!! Alot I Used only Once in awhile.

I Still have about 6 or 7 - Again , Not all have Balances so I Don't See a problem. Our Credit Score is always Fine - even with all the available credit.

We have quite a few cards also, because we have store specific cards in addition to the Discover, etc. I guess I don't think it matter as much how many cards you have, as it does to how much you OWE on them. We may have several cards but we pay them all off each month so we pay no interest. I think that's better than someone with just one or two that has a large balance and pays a lot of interest each month.

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Including Best Buy & Lowes I think we have 9. Only 1 has a balance though and it'll be gone in a few months!! I've opened at least 2 to transfer balances over the years and the others are probably ones I've had since college.

We do have a HUGE amount of open credit - probably like $70,000 or something. We could go out tomorrow and rack up quite a bit! Obviously this is WAY more than we should ever need, but I've always heard that closing down credit cards will negatively affect your credit score. Of course I've also heard that having a huge credit limit like this isn't really good either since we could go spend it tomorrow.

We're planning on buying a new house anywhere from possibly 3 months from now to a year and a half from now. Does anyone know what's the best thing to do for your credit score?? Go close down half of them - keep 1 card? I don't want to go shut a bunch down and have our credit scores go down, but if we wait till we try to get pre-approved and they say it's bad to have too much open credit then shutting them down then will be worse, right?

Anyone know what we should do???

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Stay at home mom to my 3 boys... ages 5, 3 & 1!

I can do all things through CHRIST who strengthens me. Philippians 4:13

When we bought our first house in 95 I Had all those credit cards as I Mentioned.
When we did a Pre approval - the lender told me to close the ones I had no balances on.
When I Closed them my " available credit" Decreased , so this brought up my score.

See this is what I was worried about - but do you cancel ALL of them?? I wouldn't think that would be good either... I don't know. Oh, and did your score go up right away? Or did it take a while??

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Stay at home mom to my 3 boys... ages 5, 3 & 1!

I can do all things through CHRIST who strengthens me. Philippians 4:13