Quote Originally Posted by Grant Wilkinson View Post
In Canada, you need to be careful about having too many cards. Even if you pay them off completely each month, they affect your credit rating. When lenders check your credit rating, the maximum on each of those cards is considered a liability. So, if I have 3 x $10,000 max limit cards, lenders assume that I already have a $30,000 loan against my income. This can affect their decision to give me a car loan or mortgage, for example.
I don't think that is correct. They go by "credit utilization" which should always be below 30% and having more than one card with a small amount on each is better than one with over 30% on it. Scotiabank recommends using a higher limit to reduce the credit utilization rating as a good solution. A problem with applying for several cards in a short time-frame is that it causes a hard-check of your rating and this can negatively impact your score.