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You need to strike the right balance in your decisions. The average length of time your credit card accounts have been open is an important contributer to your credit score. So the accounts that have been open longer are more valuable in this regard than the newer accounts. But if you have too many credit card accounts, your credit score would not be as good as it would be if you had all of that outstanding credit on fewer accounts. And if you close an account that had a large credit line, you could skew your debt-to-credit-ratio.
Here are two examples that may require different choices:
1) You have 20 credit card accounts with equal credit lines, no balance on any of them, and they have all been opened for the same length of time. In this situation, I would feel very comfortable closing one or more of the accounts.
2) You have 3 credit card accounts. One has been open 10 years and has a $5000.00 balance on a $7000.00 credit limit. Another has been open 5 years and has no balance on a $2000.00 credit limit. And the third has been open one year and has no balance on an $8000.00 credit limit.
It seems like closing the account that has been open one year would help right? But it is not so simple. Your debt-to-credit ratio is .294 when all three accounts are open but jumps to .556 when you close the account that has been open for one year.
So, take these things in to consideration before acting on your brother's advice or making a different decision.
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