Don’t Take It Too Soon
This topic will affect millions of people in our country. It seems every day I answer some form of the same question, “When should I (or we) take Social Security benefits?”
For many this benefit may be the largest asset they have. And this one decision may be the most significant planning decision you’ll make for your retirement years.
I believe I cannot provide you with enough information about this.
Most of us, if we are married, are faced with thousands of possible ways we can claim Social Security benefits. How would anyone know the best strategy without some help?
If you remember nothing else about when to file, remember waiting is generally better. All the way to 70 for many of you.
I want to share two articles with you.
First, in the article Vast majority of Americans should wait until 70 to collect Social Security, the National Bureau of Economic Research believes more than 90 percent of Americans should wait until age 70 to begin taking Social Security benefits. Currently, only 10 percent wait until age 70 to draw benefits.
The second article is from an industry publication, Think Advisor entitled, Don’t Let Social Security Dupe Your Clients Into Claiming Early. A guru of Social Security benefits, Lawrence Kotlikoff, professor of economics at Boston University, also weighed in declaring that we should not let our clients be duped by Social Security to take benefits early. He explains quite a bit more in the rest of his article.
Before you file, your family or friends file, they should get a full report and understand out of the thousands of strategies and scenarios available which are potentially best for them. With just your Social Security statements we can run the report for you.
We’ll gladly run the report for you. Send over your statements when you’re ready.
If you’re unable to retrieve these articles, let us know and we’ll send you a copy.
