Questions and Answers

My daughter will turn 18 in several months. She wants to apply for a Chase Sapphire or Southwest card and very very slowly build miles. What are your suggestions for applying? Just one card? Should she bother with Sapphire given her zero credit history? Thanks

Chase is hard, in my experience, at least for someone starting out.

I’m planning on starting my niece out with the Amex PRG, as it’s one of the easier “premium” cards to get approved for, even though it doesn’t have a huge signup bonus. There are several approaches to take (some like to start with student-specific cards, for example), so hopefully others have more insights to add!

Personally I’m a fan of no AF cards that earn transerrable points for the future… think Freedom, Everyday, TY Preferred. Builds your age of credit since you won’t be canceling these and the currencies will be useful in the future when she gets premium cards.

I started my kids out with the Chase Freedom card. When they graduated they add Sapphire. My one son tried to get sapphire before he graduated but no luck and applied again 3 months after graduation and had a full time job and was approved.

I prefer no annual fee cards as the initial cards. There are so many awesome no AF cards in my opinion. Discover-it, Citi double cash back, chase freedom, amex everyday etc.
I would personally add the annual fee cards to my portfolio at a later point of time.