shullen

I can't find answer to this in previous thread.

We are due to move to the US in the new year. Everything seems daunting at the moment. We heard that US banks don't normally let you have a credit card unless you have some credit history, which applies to other things such as renting a house, getting a phone contract, or more importantly, getting a mortgage etc. However, I bank with First Direct and my husband bank with HSBC. I heard that it would have been an easy transfer and the US bank account would have been opened before we even land in US if they have a local branch. However, as we are not going to the most popular states (OK), they don't have any branches. What should we do in this case? Do we have to bring over paper copy of our past bank statement or credit card statement?

Thanks

Noorah101

Check out the Wiki Guide:

http://britishexpats.com/wiki/Category:USA_Credit

Rene

TimNiceBut

I'm pretty sure this has been covered regularly on here.

There are two options:

1. If you have had an Amex card in good standing for more than a year before you move to the US, you can apply for them to transfer your UK card to a US card. That card will show up in your US credit history with the start date of the UK card, so that's instant credit history.
2. You can get a secured card from most Too Big To Fail banks and probably from community banks and credit unions, too. Basically, you have to deposit money with them and the credit limit equals your deposit. It still acts as a credit card and as long as you don't use too much of your credit limit and pay the card in time, you'll be building a credit history.

I did go the Amex route and this proved to be very useful as I had a very decent credit score that allowed us to buy a house within two years with a very reasonable deposit and a very good rate.

Guindalf

Also, get credit even if you don't need it! By this, I mean buy furniture or anything else you need from stores that offer six months same as cash, where you make a down-payment and then pay off the balance over six/nine/twelve months.

It costs you nothing (as long as you make the payments) and it is reported to the credit agencies.

The golden rule is usually "Don't buy anything you can't afford to pay off in cash of you need to"!

This does NOT mean go to a buy here, pay here operation that may charge extortionate rates of interest.

TimNiceBut

Keep in mind however that the credit bureaus also take a dim view of opening too many account in too short a timeframe, so I would suggest to spread out the credit purchases.

If the OP doesn't bring enough cash for a half-decent car they'd have to finance a car anyway (and not at a buy-here-pay-here place unless they want to pay horrendous interest rates).

shullen

Great advice here. I have an American Express card for over three years now so will definitely give them a call.

In terms of the order of things, what should I do first? We are planning to rent a vacation home for a few weeks while waiting for our shipment to arrive via the container company and looking for a rental home. But I guess without a proper address, we can't apply for driving license and apply for schools. Also not sure how bank will be happy about a temporary address to open an account. Address will also be essential for us to apply for Social Security Numbers. So what is the best order to process such things?

GeoffM

Who knows that it's a temporary address? You could rent a mailbox for a while I guess, though not every organization will send stuff to those. The important thing is to ensure that anything arriving after you leave gets re-routed to your new address.

Bink

They do, but it's hard to know what the overriding factor is. I'm at 5 hard enquiries right now, but in doing so my credit score has gone up as I now have substantially more available credit and my useage is much lower as a percentage.

It's tough becuase without damaging your credit score you can't really improve it quickly either. Even with 5 hard enquiries I'm still in the 740's. I think different lenders view different criteria differently so it's hard to know what they make of it.

Most important thing is start building credit as soon as you come over, even if you have to get a secured card. Many of the banks will try and get you to apply for a non-secured credit card first - I wouldn't necessarily recommend this as many of them have automatic denials for those with less than 2 years credit history.

Getting a good score won't be your biggest hurdle, getting a 2yr credit history will. I managed to get a mortgage after about 18 months credit history with a good rate - using a secured credit card and then a car loan with 6 months payments, then providing my UK credit and mortgage histories to the lender.

TimNiceBut

That's going to be your easiest route to credit history as you'll end up with however much you have in the UK with Amex straight away.

You can only call them once you have moved, but there's information to be found here: http://www.americanexpress.com/global-card-transfers/

That shouldn't be a problem, we lived in a vacation home for a couple of months when we first moved up here. No issues with either banks or the DMV. After all, they can't really tell if you're moving because it's temp accommodation or because you didn't like the neighbours.

shullen

Thanks for the advice.

I only found out about vacation home last week and they seem to be a much better choice than hotel. There also seem to be furnished apartment which I am looking at it too. Will school allow such address?

Bob

Then you didn't bother to look at all.

AddyLaddy

We used a VRBO property for our 1st week whilst we found a long term rental. But to get into the schools we had to show them the contract for the long term rental. So you may struggle there, but perhaps it'll be OK if your vacation rental is for several months?

We spent the 1st week looking for rentals, visiting the schools and getting registered at the local surgery. The kids had to have a lot of jabs (8-10 for each child!) in order to be allowed to go to school.

I got a secured CC and that did help us build up credit history. But it was still a bit of a struggle to get a mortgage after only 18m here. In particular they wanted 2 year's worth of tax returns from the IRS.

shullen

We had a meeting with an mortgage adviser in US a year ago when we try to decide whether to relocate. She has suggested that we provide our credit card, car loans and mortgage statement etc so that a credit history can be built up for us. However, from what everybody says here and the wiki guide, it seems that only purchases/record in the US count. Don't really fancy renting for three years before we can buy a house though. With paying over $2000 dollar for a decent house in the school district that we want, not including any local taxes etc, it seems quite a waste of money. Is still the same difficulty if you can put down 30% for deposits?

I happen to be looking at VBRO property as well. Hubby's company has only agreed to cover the initial 6 weeks of rental costs so can't really live there for months. There are very few properties available for the school we want to send our kids (only 2 showing on the website so far) so can't imagine it will take that long to decide. I was planning to buy as soon as we get the green card (hopefully in a year) but might have to delay now till we can get a mortgage.

Bob

All depends on the local market...30% is good, but more helps. Some places it won't be a problem, in others it will be.

Don't think of renting as a waste of money, just a cost of living, plus it's much cheaper to rent if you're going to stay in the place less than 5-8 years for the most part.

Also it's a crap idea buying in the first year or two anyway, for so many reasons.

retzie

Where in Oklahoma? I don't know if you've already looked at house prices, but they are very low. This results in a poor rental market, since it is expected that anyone of any means will buy, ie. grad students and above. (Yes, grad students qualify as 'people of means'!)

I lived in a college town and the very small number of good rentals was basically impossible to get, as the temporary professors snapped them up immediately. On the other hand, crappy rentals were absolutely everywhere.

Also, if you want any kind of functional service from your bank, I would suggest looking out of state. I ended up with Charles Schwab Bank, after various disastrous, 1950's-style moments with my local bank. (Debit card details stolen, 2 weeks for replacement card, "oh, you'll just have to write cheques in the meantime" )

Apart from that, prepare to enjoy Oklahoma-style barbecue (dry smoked, rather than covered in sauce). That is literally the only thing I wasn't overjoyed to leave behind...