so in today's video I'm going over a question I get asked all the time and that is how many credit cards I should have and specifically what credit card should I have based on age and I'm going to be sure to go over my top card recommendations for each age category in 2023. now for our new viewers out there hi my name is John of John's Finance tips I'm the guy who's had well over 50 credit cards and millions more of miles and points also that you don't have to the only thing you have to do is tap that little thumb icon now having been in the credit card game for close to a decade now I can certainly recognize that everyone's card situation is going to be different some of you are going to be further along While others are going to be further behind but just use this video as a guide relative to where you are on your credit card Journey however regardless of where you are on your journey the most important thing to do when it comes to credit cards is paying on time and in full and as a quick reminder for everybody your credit score which is the number that could save you tens maybe hundreds of thousands of dollars in unnecessary interest payments is affected by five key components and the two most important our on-time payments which accounts for 35 of your score and credit utilization which accounts for 30. those two added together is 65 of your score therefore that's why I always say if you want to play this game the way that I play it please make sure you are paying on time and in full the video is going to break down as so first we'll talk about the age bracket then we'll talk about the types of cards you should see in there then the annual fee followed by the number of cards I expect you to have there and of course the ultimate goal in that particular bracket if you have any questions feel free to comment down below and if you want to support my channel feel free to check out any of my affiliate links in the description box the first age bracket is under 18. technically if you're under 18 you can't get a card so this is actually more applicable to someone who is over the age of 18 that might have children or friends or just relatives who are under the age of 18 and they're thinking of them and looking out for their financial success because as an under 18 the only way for you to get a credit card and the type of credit card you can get is to get added as an authorized user to someone who's over the age of 18 honestly folks this is really how some of the rich set their kids up for Success Little Johnny turns 18 and already has a 700 credit score how is that possible that's because Little Johnny's parents added him as an authorized user when he was 15 or 13 and he was able to inherit some of his parents good credit and therefore when he was going to apply for his individual cards he already had a really strong profile I do want to caution and say if you add someone as an authorized user they are 100 not responsible for the debt meaning you give them the card and they go charge off ten thousand dollars they never have to pay it back because it flows to you and you're going to be responsible so my recommendation is if you're adding someone as an authorized user and you're not confident that they fully know how to manage your credit card just take the card and put in a sock drawer because they will still inherit some of your good credit profile the other thing to note is various banks have various different age requirements in which you can add them as an authorized user for example Amex will allow you to add someone as an authorized user at age 13 whereas discover won't let you add them until they're 15 but here's a helpful chart breaking down all the different banks and their age requirement to add someone as an authorized user next up we have annual fee now for authorized user cards that's not really as applicable because as the recipient of the card there's not necessarily an annual fee but there is a fee to add an authorized user and that's going to vary anywhere from free to 75 dollars per card or more next up we have number of cards I'd see at this point one card is good enough I'd recommend trying to get the best card meaning a card with very low utilization typically that would mean a car with a high credit limit that would probably help the most but you really don't need to go above and beyond to have multiple cards added because even though there's a benefit to be added as an authorized user it doesn't necessarily scale linearly the more that are added on and finally goals what exactly should you be doing if you are the recipient of the car meaning you're under the age of 18 your goal really here is to start figuring out how exactly do these credit cards work now I was fortunate enough in which my parents added me as an authorized user and they drilled it into my head that we pay our credit cards 100 and now they didn't explain to me why it was just you spend the money you have to pay us and so at a very early age maybe 17 18 or so I kind of knew okay if I use this thing I got to pay it back and so I would say if you are someone giving someone a card to be an authorized using your account start teaching them how they can efficiently manage your credit profile and if you're under the age of 18 take it as a learning experience the second bracket 18 to 21 year olds congratulations you might have just started college or you are off to work your very first job regardless though the common theme that unites both of these folks is the fact that you're probably pretty broke your first job is not paying you very much and if you're in college you're probably not making very much either but you're thinking well you know if I just got a credit card I could put some spend on that makes minimum payments yeah I'm gonna pause you right there no remember a credit card you must pay on time and in full in this age group it is the most important time to not rack up any unnecessary debt credit card debt being one of them so the two types of cards you're going to be looking at are either student credit cards or secured credit cards assuming that you weren't fortunate enough to be added as an authorized user when you're under the age of 18 to someone with a strong credit profile student credit cards and secured credit cards all look to benefit those with a very limited or next to no credit profile because pretty much anyone can get approved first let's talk about a secured credit card this is a type of credit card in which you put down some sort of deposit in the credit limit you are given is equal to the deposit so let's say you put down a 200 deposit well now you have a credit limit of 200 and you can use the credit limit spend it pay it off spend it pay it off and if that anytime you cancel the card you will get your deposit back in addition if at any time you graduate from a secured card to a unsecured card you will get your deposit back but you will still have an available credit limit the thinking here is we don't know if we can trust you so you give us your money we'll hold on to it you show us your responsible when paying it back off at some point we'll give you back your money and extend You Credit One card I would take a look at in this segment is the Discover over it secured now typically secured credit cards come with no bells and whistles but the discovery secured it's actually got some stuff going on for starters you get two percent cash back for spending at gas stations or restaurants on up to a thousand dollars to spend per quarter and you'll get one percent cash back on all your other purchases and in your very first year they'll actually double your cash batch basically they'll match it so in fact you're gonna get four percent and two percent respectively and what I really love about the Discover it's secured is that at month seven they will start automatically just looking at your profile to see hey can we graduate you from this secured card give you deposit back and give you an unsecured card now let's talk about student cards very similar to secured cards in that they're looking to benefit those with a small credit profile the difference being you don't have to put up any amount of money but do expect that you're gonna have a very low credit limit for student cards for the most part there's not a whole tons of bells and whistles other than this card I found right here which is the Chase Freedom Student card this is actually card that I had when I was back in college surprisingly again this card comes with a 50 sign on bonus just for making a first purchase within the first three months and as far as cashback this card comes with a one percent cashback on everything no limit and for every single year that the card is in good standing meaning you're making your payments on time in full you're not delinquent on anything you'll get 20 bucks and after five months of on-time payments within a 10-month window they'll automatically consider you for a credit limit increase the annual fee for folks in this bracket looking at these type of cards is zero dollars if you're looking at a secured card that has some sort of fee or annual fee run don't walk that is a predatory card and I haven't seen any student cards that charge an annual fee but again you should not be paying any sort of annual fee at this level number of cards in this age bracket one that's probably gonna be enough maybe two but the focus for a lot of folks especially if you're in college it's not getting a bunch of credit cards to figure out this down the other thing probably in college going to class and all the other extracurricular activities and so I would say getting a bunch of cards to juggle them probably isn't the most efficient use of your time the goals in this age bracket getting comfortable with how a credit card Works inside and out do you understand your statement closed date do you understand your due date are you paying everything in full do you understand the fact that if you carry a credit card balance you're paying for my free vacation so don't carry a credit card balance that's it you are learning this is really step one of the credit card game but for right now the most important focus is making sure you understand how exactly all this credit card stuff works before we pile out more bells and whistles that's what this segment is this is boring this is dull there shouldn't be anything that's really enticing you to do something you wouldn't do namely oh I get a couple of these I get a sign up bonus I get cash back like that's it's a bit much for a lot of people and it's kind of a slippery slope regardless focus on learning and educating yourself as we get ready for the next category the next age bracket we have is 22 to 26 year olds here if you were in college you likely are getting your first job if you didn't go to college you likely are climbing up the food chain regardless the Common Thread here for both groups is that that you're starting to make some more serious chi-ching and your credit cards are going to start reflecting that so broadly there are two types of credit cards I see for people in this category one are what I would term my beginner credit cards and the second are the mid-tier travel cards so let's first cover the beginner tier of credit cards so in the beginner category I would look at credit cards with slightly higher elevated signup bonuses and with better cash back options one of my favorite beginner credit cards is the Capital One Quicksilver so this card currently has a 200 signup bonus after you spend 500 bucks and it has 1.5 cashback everywhere and this is where I started to pick up some of my training habits where I started thinking wait a minute if I just get one or two of these cards and I'm already going to spend the money then I'm just gonna save 200 100 300 another solid beginner card in this category is the city custom cash this is a phenomenal gas or grocery cart so this card will earn you a 200 signup bonus after you spend fifteen hundred dollars in the first six months but what's beautiful about this card is the fact that for your highest spend category every single month you're going to get five percent cash back on up to 500 of spend every single month so let's say the highest spend you have every month is gas because you have to commute to work well just swipe the city custom cash and you're gonna get a five percent discount or let's say you buy a ton of groceries great only use this card for groceries and you're going to get that five percent discount the other category of cards here are the mid-tier travel cards now even though I call them travel cards I would say you don't have to necessarily travel to get value from them I think the industry just calls them travel cards because you will get more benefit but non-travelers can stand to benefit as well and really thinking about where people are you just graduated maybe you want to do some trips you've got some more disposable income you want to do some traveling this is the perfect time to get one of these cards to optimize on that travel spend so two cards I would take a look at the first is the built MasterCard this is the only card on the list that lets you earn points for rent in addition to being one of my favorite no annual fee premium travel cards so if you just moved out you're going to the big city you're paying one thousand two thousand three thousand dollars a month in rent hopefully or not say you are get points for it Bill lets you earn points for it you can then take the point and transfer them to a flight partner travel partner to have all the fun this card will earn 3x on dining 2x on travel and 1X for rent and 1X on all other purchases another card you could take a look at is one of my favorite American Express credit cards is the American Express gold this card is going to have a center bonus of anywhere from 60 to 70 000 points depending on when you find it during the year after you spend about four thousand dollars in six months what I love about the gold though is the fact that you can earn four points for every single dollar you spend on grocery stores as well as four points for every single dollar you spend dining out 3x for booking airfare direct with an airline or three MX travel and 1X everywhere else you see both of these cards can be used for travel however the build card is phenomenal for someone who rents and the AmEx gold is phenomenal for someone who eats food and because in the 18 to 21 bracket you figured out how credit cards work you are really now a master of how to optimize for different spend categories across various different cards so the annual fees that you should be expecting to pay here are going to range from zero dollars to probably a hundred and not more than that and I'm sure some of you would have picked up the fact that the American Express gold actually has a 250 annual fee it does but it also comes with credits specifically a 120 dining credit and a 120 Uber Eats credit so it comes with two hundred and forty dollars worth of total credits against a 250 annual fee you effectively pay ten dollars again here is where we can start really thinking about how we want to optimize for our overall credit card strategy so the number of cards I would expect someone have in this age bracket is going to be two to three not counting the ones you've had before but two to three whether it be beginner or mid-year travel cards now let's talk about the goals for this segment in this age category start really thinking about where you want to travel to and how you want to travel because to get the most value out of credit card miles and points it is going to be in the travel Redemption category of course though if you're not a huge traveler then maybe thinking about cashback how can I optimize my various cash back spends the city custom okay I've got something that's going to cover me for gas maybe I use an Amex gold for grocery I've got the build card of course for rent maybe I can add a Chase Sapphire preferred for travel whatever it is start thinking about how I can really start optimizing all the different categories across all of my cards in addition to the fact that how can I start taking some of these points right these 50 000 70 100 000 Point sign up bonuses and start redeeming them for free travel the next age bracket we have is going to cover the rest which is going to be 27 and over at this point you're likely getting into a early to slash mid career the income is going up but you've got other things going on in life you're likely traveling more you've got more discretionary income and for me at the age of 27 is when I bought my very first property so we've got to think about that in terms of how is my credit score impacting my mortgage rates nevertheless the type of cards I would be looking at in this category is going to be one premium travel and two a travel specific car meaning an airline code branded card or a hotel co-branded card and one of my favorite premium travel cards in the marketplace is the Capital One Venture X this card has a 75 000 points on a bonus after you spend four thousand dollars in the first three months the earning to call out is the fact that it's two points per hour spent everywhere else but the benefits crush it because if I think about how I like to travel the perks of traveling this car gives you priority pass lounge access so these are the airport lounges where you can go for some free food free booze and if you're in Asia and Europe there might even be showers and day beds in addition it gives me a credit to Global Entry which means as a US citizen when I come back in the United States I pretty much cut all the immigration lines and kind of walk right on through in addition that comes with TSA pre-check so instead of taking off a bell taking out my laptop I can also just walk very quickly through security as I'm getting to the airport another Workhorse card in the premium travel category is going to be the American Express Platinum now this card is not for everyone however it is good for the first year signup bonus which can range anywhere from 80 to 125 000 points but the AmEx Platinum has a ton of bells and whistles if you are in some way or category that requires a lot of travel I'm looking at you Consultants you guys are Road Warriors the AmEx Platinum is going to give you a ton of benefits for everyone else though I would say get the card get the sign up bonus year one year two if they don't give your retention offer I'd probably just move on to the next one and as for airline Hotel specific cards remember for the past couple years you've been really optimizing and thinking about how you want to travel do you want to go to Europe and business or do a bunch of economy flights over to Asia so in this age category I have no problem looking at airliner Hotel specific cards one of my favorite Airline specific cards is the city American Airlines card where I guess you could also look at the Barclays American Airlines card either way both cards specifically earn points for American Airlines which I think is still has one of the most valuable Redemption charts for partners in the entire credit card game here's what I mean by that next year I'm flying from Boston to Beijing instead of paying 14 000 out of pocket I'm paying less than 30 and I'm just using 70 000 American Airlines miles another example flying from Boston to the Maldives instead of paying eight thousand dollars to Qatar Airways you could spend less than and fifty dollars and seventy thousand American Airlines miles another card to take a look at is the Chase card that's co-granted with Hyatt I personally believe Hyatt is one of the most valuable hotel chains left unfortunately hotels get devalued year over year and the points are worth less and less every year kind of like our dollar however Hyatt is still one of the last standouts so an example I did was down in Playa del Carmen it was 25 000 points a night at that point now it's close to 30 000 points per night but regardless it's a hotel room that goes anywhere from 700 to a thousand dollars a night all I did was use my Hyatt points and I paid zero dollars in this hotel with the secrets moche it's an all-inclusive meaning the food the drink everything was included that's insane value and again this is something you'll know because you spent the last couple years trying to figure out hey how do I want to travel maybe I've read some travel blogs I know I want to make this Redemption great I'm going to get this particular card because it's going to give me these particular points that I'm gonna use for this particular Redemption so the annual fee that you should expect to pay for most of these cards are gonna be anywhere from probably over three hundred dollars to getting paid five bucks I know it's kind of crazy The Venture X earlier I mentioned is my favorite card in 2023 partly because it pays me five bucks effectively even though it's a premium travel card it competes with the American Express Platinum it competes with the Chase Sapphire reserve the difference is the Venture X comes with 395 annual fee but it gives an aggregate total of four hundred dollars worth of travel credit 300 credit to redeem through their travel portal and a 100 anniversary credit that's insane value whereas you look at the American Express Platinum it's a 695 a year card for most people taking out the useful credits you'll probably pay one to two hundred dollars still and for the co-branded cards they largely come in at 95 someone actually will waive the annual fee in the first year and then you'll be paid and you'll see the second year just cancel in the second year but again paying a couple hundred bucks for an annual fee but getting a sign of bonus that's worth 70 80 100 000 Plus in points to me is 100 worth it the number of cards in this category truthfully it's as many as you need now I did mention at 27 is when I bought my first property and so for me a couple months before closing on that loan I actually made sure I was not applying or getting any credit cards because Banks don't like that you're getting new credit if you are going for a loan so keep that in mind when do you think you're gonna be buying a house or buying a car and you want to slow down some of your credit card activity before that and then once you buy it go gun ho of course though after that a year later we bought another and a year later we bought another and so for me it was like these windows where okay we closed our ground we need a bunch of cards okay we're gonna buy something in the next six months okay I'm gonna slow down my activity but you want to be cognizant of that not that it's the end of the world but it's certainly not going to help you from a mortgage perspective if you're opening up a bunch of credit cards right in the period in which you got pre-approved and before you close on your loan and last point is what's the goal in this category well as you can see 27 plus is literally the rest of your life the goal here is just kick back and enjoy it take the time to learn how the game works take the time to get the optimal sign of bonuses take the the time to get the best redemptions but really the goal here is just enjoy the points you know I want to take a moment here and share with you a great podcast that I listen to that actually changed my perception on points so I've got millions of miles and points and I've not so much been hoarding them because covid kind of made it difficult to travel but I certainly have been reluctant to redeem them because the thinking is oh man if I use it I'm not going to have it and they're hard to accumulate part of me also is well every single year these points become worth less and less right the award charts come out and the devalue flight miles and they devalue Hotel points and so for me at this category it is earn them and try to redeem them and use them to give you an example this year we're going to Hawaii I'm going to Thailand and then we're going to China next year and then we're going to the Maldives next year we've got four trips booked every single one of them is booked on business every single one is booked with points I am paying pretty much next to nothing out of pocket I think on average per trip 50 to 100 in tax and fees per person and that's really just to drive home the fact that earn the points use them when it makes sense don't hold for too long because you never know when the next day suddenly they're worth 50 less awesome well hey folks thank you so much for joining me on this incredible video I hope you took something out of it but I would love to hear people's comments and feedback down below do these age brackets kind of make sense now earlier I did say depending on if you're earlier or later just kind of move it to shift where you are in your credit card Journey do you have more cards in a particular age bracket do you have less cards in a particular age bracket do you have no cards at all and as always though I will catch you all next week peace