My debt is being added to my brothers credit, I want to help prevent that if possible
Tl;dr - I had a bank account with my name and my brothers SSN. It was completely accidental and has since been closed, but every time I take out a new loan or take on new debt, my brother always knows about it because it's on his credit report. Is there any way to prevent my debt from being associated with my brother's credit?
History: I'm a Canadian-American and when we immigrated to the US the government gave my brother and I sequential social security numbers. I can't remember exactly how it happened, but somehow I opened a savings or checking account at WellsFargo with my brothers SSN (it was my first time using a SSN and I guess I memorized the wrong one). We didn't find out about it until my brother went to get a credit card with them later on. I had to change my banking login info and that's about all that came of it. I still have a credit card with them under my SSN, it's paid off and I'm fine with closing it if that's a good idea.
Fast forward: Credit cards, student loans, cars, houses etc. whatever debt I take on it shows up on my brothers credit. So, whenever he wants to do something like 'buy a house' or 'refinance a loan' he has to dispute my debt with the credit companies before he can do it (my debt brings his score down), which is it's own special level of hell. He understandably blames me (not in a mean way, we get along fine) and I just want to do something, ANYTHING to help him not have to keep going through this.
Extra details: I haven't been able to pull a credit report on my own for years. I know huge faux-pas for this subreddit, but it's such a hassle because every time I try and get a free credit report it turns into postal purgatory where I need to mail a form and then wait for a reply and then mail more things and it's a cycle that lasts months. So I'm sorry, but I have no clear idea what's on my credit report for at least the last 5 years. I will say that I remember stuff missing from my report when I did get it and that there was some of my stuff duplicated on both of our reports, but my report didn't have any of his stuff on it. I'm working on getting my credit report right now (via mail, I tried via the web before writing).
The ask: Is there anything I can do? Should I contact each of my credit card companies, loan holders, etc. and tell them not to apply my debt to my brothers credit? Can I even do that? Will writing each of the credit bureaus and telling them my story help? Should I get an accountant or a lawyer? Should I turn myself in for identity theft? Is it even technically identity theft? Clearly more of an r/legaladvice question I'm just trying to think outside the box. I just want to help my brother live a normal life where he doesn't need to worry about my debt before he can do anything fiance related and I also (selfishly) want to live a normal life where my brother doesn't know/ judge me for how much I spent on my car or that I have $x,xxx amount of credit card debt.
I appreciate any guidance any of you can provide!
Posted Jan 5, 2017, 11:17 PM UTC