My Parents Opened A Credit Card In My Name When I Was 17 And I Just Found Out About It

Location: Florida
I'm 23 and applied for an apartment this week. The property manager mentioned an old delinquent account on my credit report that I didn't recognize, so I pulled all my reports and found a credit card opened under my name about six years ago, when I was 17.

It currently shows a little over $6,000 owed and multiple missed payments. I have never had this card, never used this bank, and didn't even know the account existed.

I called my mom because the mailing address on the old account was my parents' house. After avoiding the question for a while, she admitted that she and my dad opened it because they were having financial problems at the time.

She keeps saying they "always intended to pay it back" and that reporting it as fraud could get them in serious trouble. My dad is now asking me to just let them make payments until it's gone.

The problem is, this has apparently been sitting on my credit for years and it's affecting me now. They also won't give me any statements or tell me exactly how they managed to open it while I was under 18.

I haven't contacted the card issuer yet because I don't want to accidentally say something that makes it sound like I accepted the debt. What is the proper way to dispute something like this when the person who opened it is a parent? Does the fact that I was 17 when the account was created change anything?

I'm also worried there could be other accounts I haven't found yet. I obviously don't want to destroy my relationship with my parents, but I also really don't want to spend years paying for debt that isn't mine.