On Monday, I received a letter in the mail from what looks to be a legit collection agency. It says this is an attempt to collect a debt and points me to a website where I can enter all my information and pay it. Of course this looks suspicious since I've never had the credit card they say that I have, so I checked my credit. To my horror, there it was, opened last year and for the same amount of money the collection agency wants.

I called the credit card company directly and they said the address they had on file for me was my parents' house, where I haven't lived in more than 5 years. The card was used almost exclusively in the area right around where my parents live. None of my siblings live around there either, which made me believe my parents did this.

When I asked them about it, they denied everything. I finally told them I had a list of places where it was used and I could get more information and they flipped. They called me ungrateful and demanding, obviously trying to gaslight me. Finally, they told me to either drop it or report the card is stolen to try to get it off of my record. They said if I reported it to the police, they would take me out of their will.

I never expected any inheritance at all, but now I'm weighing the pros and cons to all of this. I'm trying to buy a house next year and I don't think I'll be able to with this on my credit. What's my best course of action here?