My Sapphire Aspirations Denied : Chase 5/24 Rule

Late last year I applied for a Chase Sapphire card.  The card has a 50,000 point bonus when you spend $4000 in the first 3 months.    That is good for $625 in travel.   Thats a nice bonus.   My credit score has been over 820 for a few months and I haven't signed up for any cards for a while so I figured its about time to get some more bonus money.   Chase turned me down.     I was too ashamed to talk about it until now.  Not really.

This is the first time I recall being turned down for a credit card forever.    I can't remember it happening before.   I imagine it might have happened at some point in my early 20's when I was broke, unemployed and in debt but even then I am not sure.   They used to throw credit at college kids.  I was slightly offended that Chase did not deem me worthy to carry their Sapphire card.   It could be a little puzzling given that they already gave me a Freedom card and a IHG card with a very high limit as well as serving as our primary bank.    They know I'm good for it.    But I figured that the obvious answer was that they thought I had too many credit cards.    I've been signing up for cards more and more lately to cash in the bonus money.  

My suspicions were proven when I heard about Chase's 5/24 rule.     There is a FAQ covering the topic at Flyertalk     Various other sites discuss it as well.   Apparently the rule is that Chase will deny applications for their Sapphire or Freedom cards if you have opened 5 or more cards within the past 24 months.

Most recent cards I've applied for :
3/14 - Barclay Salliemae
3/14 - Fidelity Amex
3/15 - Amex Blue
3/15 - IHG chase
4/15 - USBank Cash+
4/15 - Citi Thankyou
11/15 -  Chase Sapphire - denied

So given that history, it will be next month when I'm past the point of having 5 cards opened in the previous 24 months.   I should then be able to apply for the Chase Sapphire card and hopefully not be spurned yet again sometime post March.

Or my wife could just get one.  

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