Everything you read is wait, wait, to take your benefit check. It will be bigger the more time you can hold off and maybe you should. However there can be times when taking it early does make sense.
If you hold off until age 70, you can get in some cases a 32% higher check amount, so why not suck it up and grind on to hold off and get paid more? There’s a few reasons and here they are:
1) Your health is not so great. If you wake up in the morning and go to the kitchen to get the plastic weekly pill box out of the cupboard and think to yourself, “OK it’s Tuesday right? I’ll take the blue one with coffee, the white one with lunch and the last 2 with dinner.” Maybe taking it early is a good idea. If you take your benefit at age 62, you will getting 75% of a check than if you waited until you’re full retirement age–let’s say that’s 66 years old. Are mom or dad still alive? Siblings? What you doing here is trying to handicap or project your life expectancy? Cancer survivor, heart attacks, high blood pressure…whichever it is no one here gets out alive.
If you added up the total checks if you take it early compared to taking it at full retirement age –66- if you take it early and die before you’re 75, you picked the right one. If you take it at 66, and died after 75, you picked the right one. Its the total amount that you receive that is the measuring stick here.
2) You’re out of work and just need the income. Completely understandable. You have to live. So if you’ve been downsized out of your job at age 63 and there’s not appearing to be a lot out there, maybe it’s a good idea. There is a 12 month window where you can stop it. Let’s say you got downsized, unemployed and you opted to start receiving benefits. then your friend calls and tells you to come down to his office that’s 3 miles away from your home, you know just about everyone there, the money’s right and they are the hiring manager. You get the job and all is well but then you remember you have your Social Security check still coming in which now you don’t need thanks to your new employment. You have 12 months after the date of the first check to stop your benefits. However you must pay back everything you received and the Social Security Administration will expunge your record like it never happened and you go on paying into the system.
3) Your spouse didn’t work or didn’t contribute to the system. Let’s say your spouse is older than you and their benefit at 66 is $350. If you take your benefit early than they could get their spousal benefits which could be and probably would be higher than claiming on their own record.
Handicapping your own life expectancy can sound like an unpleasant thing to do. Imagining your own demise is practical and necessary when contemplating when to take your benefits. Maybe consult your doctor, look at your family, and really kind of face the facts. Financially you could be better of claiming early.
All for now gentle reader. Until next time so long.
Jeff Dragon 
Leave a comment