Credit History Score

Dear Liz: My husband and I decided to start using a second airline frequent-flier program and applied for its credit card. I was turned down on the grounds of "few revolving accounts opened long enough to establish credit history" and "not enough accounts opened long enough to establish a credit history." My husband then applied for the same card, with the same response.

We have an annual income above $170,000, we own a $750,000 home outright and have investments of $1.5 million. We have no debts and we've had the one credit card we use (a MasterCard) for 15 years. We always pay the bill in full every month, and we have never been anywhere near the $25,000 credit limit. Our FICO scores are about 750.

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Tennessee poverty rate rises more quickly than U.S. rate

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Darts & Laurels

Speaking of the boss, we offer a glad-you're-back-because-this-spring-may-be-your-only-chance-to-graduate DART to Bernie Machen for suggesting that summer school may have to be taken away to make up for the $16 million deficit due to state budget cuts. Surely, there are other ways to make up for the shortage.However, despite our usual reluctance, we can't help but offer a they-want-us-to-return-to-a-safer-campus-with-a-system-that-actually-works LAUREL to University of Florida officials for their plans to test the emergency text-messaging system for the first time Tuesday.With LSU's recent glitch, UF made the right choice to avoid similar problems and make sure all students have up-to-date information in case of an emergency.In the wake of the tragedy at Virginia Tech in April, college officials can't leave much to chance these days.And since most of us are glued to our cell phones anyway (thanks a lot for that iPhone, Steve Jobs - that didn't help), why not send us a message that we'll actually get?Unfortunately, we have no choice but to give an absolutely-no-cutesy-way-to-say-it DART to the staff of the Hilochee Wildlife Management Area for their dense decision to start a controlled burn near I-4 in Winter Haven this week.Their attempt to clear land for a wildlife habitat in one of the state's driest areas turned into a predictably out-of-control wildfire.The resulting smoke-fog mixture over the interstate led to a 70-car pileup that killed four people and hospitalized 38.We shudder to think what could have happened if they had started the fire when we were making the trek back to Gainesville.Finally, we hand over a get-a-free-set-of-handcuffs-this-semester-if-you-don't-have-a-wristband LAUREL to the Gainesville Police Department for stepping up patrols to combat the common occurrence of underage drinking.While we don't wholeheartedly agree that this will stop the baby boozers, we have high hopes that more arrests will keep more of the amateurs at home.

See-through condos

Sales contracts fell through when buyers couldn't get affordable loans. Investors who had hoped to buy in and then resell at a profit pulled out of the market. Buyers who had to sell their current homes first were stuck when they couldn't sell. Others balked at paying prices that had seemed more reasonable during the run-up in home prices.

New condo sales in metropolitan Baltimore fell 37 percent in the first half of this year - the latest statistics available - while new townhouse sales fell 15 percent, according to Hanley Wood Market Intelligence. And in the third quarter, as the credit crunch hit the market, there were more contract cancellations than sales in the Baltimore metro market, according to an analysis by Delta Associates, which includes projects that are selling or under construction.