Cut or lean Bulk after extreme weight loss?

[umbrellahorse]

So long story short, i lost 150 lbs in 1 year (30 may 2016- 30 may 2017) and i have been working out for 8 months now. And with working out i mean eating like 500 kcal under maintenance, sometimes maintenance. I have been sitting around 210 lbs (6"4) for a few months now, neither gaining or losing weight at this point. The newbie gains have stopped, i am at a stalled point now. I think i have around 10-15 lbs of loose skin still, and i am looking kinda flabby (nothing too extreme tho, i have seen worse cases)
All my friends tell me to lean bulk (i have never really bulked in the 8 months i have been lifting), they tell me i can gain some muscle mass and fill the skin without gaining to much fat. I am afraid that if i start eating above my maintenance, i will gain fat rapidly.
I can also start cutting again, but then id have to go for like 1000 kcal a day (1500 is to slow for me)
What do you guys suggest?? Bulk, or keep cutting.
Its really hard to guess my body fat percentage, when i pull my skin on my belly down you can see my abs for example. Same goes with my legs, .
Pics: imgur.c om/a/cLQhT
So my question is, shouls i try lean bulking, or try to cut even more (which has really stalled)

[katya422]

Great job on the weight loss!

Extra skin can make it tough to judge. Just from pics I would say you *could* still cut, but that doesn't mean that is the best plan right now.

I would vote to go to your estimated maintenance point for a couple of weeks and see what happens.

If you are still within a few pounds try adding 200 calories a day. Give that a couple of weeks. Scale is up just a little? Cool. Try to stay at that level for awhile.

But you might find that 2 weeks with higher calories doesn't actually move your weight much. So then you could try adding another 100 calories and see how that goes.

It isn't quick, but if you want to add muscle slow and steady with as little fat as possible it should work because if you find that you are gaining too fast you can just adjust again.

A scale trending app might help, like Happy Scale. Or you can just monitor how you are looking in the mirror and how your clothes are fitting. If the scales are slowly creeping up but the waist of your pants aren't getting much tighter then you're doing it right.

Good luck.

[kattanib]

It boils down to what is your current bodyfat and how committed are you when it comes to working out.

If you believe that working out is something you want to continue doing even after achieving your current goal (it becomes part of your life style) then cut all the way until you reach a low bodyfat level you are proud of (assuming that you have somewhat of muscles and you won't just look skinny). After that you can focus on a sustainable approach of building muscle through lean bulking and then doing quick cuts here and there every month or two so that you look and feel good all year long

Edit: just saw the picture. It's up to you but honestly you did 90% of the effort (you seem to be around 16% bf) .. go all the way to 100% (10-12% bf) and continue cutting for another 8 to 10 weeks. Then you can do lean bulking up to where you are today and cut back again. This way you will look good all year imo