Fixing my brother's credit - thoughts on my thought process?

[DeeBee78]

My younger brother has been through several ups and downs between ages 18 and 25. He's made some unfortunate life choices, and has found himself struggling with an addiction, fatherhood, and homelessness. 

He's finally pulled himself together, and has sobered up. He just landed a great job with Tesla manufacturing, and wants to give his daughter the best life he can. I told him I would help him clean up his credit, so he can buy a car, and someday a house. I'd imagine that in 18-24 months, we could have his report cleaned up to the point where I'm at now. 

I signed him up for CreditKarma, and it looks a little bleak. He has several collections, most of them emergency room visits. I believe he was insured through Medicaid at this time, so I'm not sure why these are on there. Outside of the medical debt, I see two small energy bill debts (one appears to be a duplicate), and a payday loan in default ($130), and a sizable Capital One debt for $1,000. 

I believe I can dispute away the medical debts, because he had insurance. I can dispute one of the duplicated energy bills, and pay the other, and pay the payday loan. Knowing how forgiving Capital One is, I won't ask him to pay that one, and it should fall off in two years at the most. 

Additionally, I will add him as an Authorized User on my Amex BCE, BoA BBR and probably my Chase Freedom Unlimited, so he can build some history with those three lenders. The only card I will give him is the BCE, since I can set an AU limit on it.

The eventual goal is to get him three cards of his own for FICO scoring purposes. I think I could easily get him to 700+ over the next 18-24 months, even with that Capital One debt showing. Any thoughs or suggestions on anything else I should be doing? 

[Anonymous]

It's wonderful that you're helping your brother this way. That being said, if your brother has the resources to pay Cap 1, then it would be good for him to do so if the debt is his. There was a tremendous sense of relief for me knowing that I had paid off all my collections and didn't have to worry about them contacting me for payment. Your brother should feel proud that he is in recovery. Allow him to settle the debts he can and have that feeling of accomplishment.

You know what is required to achieve his scoring goals, so I have nothing additional to add except good luck .😍

[DeeBee78]

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@Anonymous wrote:
It's wonderful that you're helping your brother this way. That being said, if your brother has the resources to pay Cap 1, then it would be good for him to do so if the debt is his. There was a tremendous sense of relief for me knowing that I had paid off all my collections and didn't have to worry about them contacting me for payment. Your brother should feel proud that he is in recovery. Allow him to settle the debts he can and have that feeling of accomplishment.

You know what is required to achieve his scoring goals, so I have nothing additional to add except good luck .😍

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I don't think he will have the money to do it. Capital One has the worst short term memory of any lender, lol.

What's interesting is that other than the collection, the account has completely disappeared from his credit reports, including all the 30/60/90 day lates. I think it's probably best to not poke the bear in this case. 

[stargazer25]

I would start him off with secured cards ASAP so he can start building his own credit. I had an old CO with Cap1 and they seem to have short term memory with me and went from secured to 4-5K QS1 within 18 months.