Walter Cavanagh's hobby is collecting active credit cards issued in his name. Which is to say that he's not interested in collecting the cards themselves, as a typical credit card collector might be (such as a member of the
American Credit Card Collectors Society). Cavanagh's collection consists entirely of cards that he could use to buy something.
By the mid-1970s, when the media first got wind of him (and dubbed him 'Mr. Plastic Fantastic'), he had already acquired 788 cards, giving him available credit of $750,000.
By 2016,
in the most recent update about him that I could find, his collection was up to 1,497 cards, giving him available credit of $1.7 million.
However, he never taps into this credit. He uses only one card, and he always pays off the balance in full each month.
![](https://www.weirduniverse.net/images/2022/creditcard01.jpg)
Los Angeles Times - Feb 1, 1976
But how does he keep getting companies to send him new cards? Wouldn't companies see the huge amount of credit already available to him and deny his application? Apparently not. Cavanagh reports that he's hardly ever had an application denied.
According to the
Next Gen Personal Finance blog, this shouldn't be surprising. Both his payment and credit history are long and positive. Also:
he has $1.7 million in available credit and since he is only using one card, his utilization rate (credit used divided by total credit) is probably less than 1% or way below the 30% that is the generally accepted figure that you want to be below.
So companies keep sending him new cards.
Category: Money | World Records | Collectors