Whenever she files, that is her filing date.
Your wife cannot draw on your social security until you file.
If she files early, she will have a reduction in benefits and will never get 1/2 of yours. She will get a top off of yours when you file but it will not equal 1/2 because she filed before her full retirement age.
There are Facebook social security filing groups, this is a very common question
Same. Schwab is always later than Fidelity and sometimes issues corrections, but availability is even later this year.
I read that there was some issue importing Schwab into TurboTax. Schwab is aware and may have resolved the problem by now.
They say to do taxes early but every year Schwab reissues. They say stuff is sent to them late.
And some K1 forms come after April 15. Oh well.
But they say to file early for safety.
Can’t win.
The deadline for brokerage providing 1099-B is Feb 17th this year, after which there can be a $60 IRS fine to brokerage per customer. One of my brokerages missed this deadline and still hasn’t provided form, but I wouldn’t expect a brokerage as large as Schwab/Fidelity to miss. Note that this deadline applies to making forms available to customer for download, not available to auto digital import in to tax software. Some of my imports won’t be available until next week.
I took SS at 62. I never thought WEP and GPO would be repealed. I get a %age less than half of my husband’s SS amount from his full retirement age now because I took mine at 62.
But I retired first. My husband didn’t collect SS until age 70.
Fidelity’s was available maybe ten days ago. Schwab still says Pending Feb 27th for the 1099 Consolidated, as in, I cannot view it yet. The small 1099-Rs were posted a while ago, but I could have manually entered those figures w/o the 1099s.
That sounds like correct advice.
Taking SS before 65 is a penalty, a certain amount per month deduct.
You can generate your own SS statement summary off the government site - it will provide your estimated benefit under all the option - full retirement, at age 70, at age 62 – and you can choose a different time – you can get a pretty good estimate. It also has your earning record from each year you worked and had taxed social security earnings. You can make sure everything is correct on overall earnings.
I did a sunset career, and as a result earned enough money on my own SS (slightly more than half of DH’s). I had an 18-year period (from my peak earnings in the late 1990’s when I needed to be home due to DH’s work travel and no family in our area – needed to have the children have the parenting and they were my first priority). I completed working and took SS and Medicare right at age 65 (full SS would have been at age 66 + four months because DH and I were both born in 1956). My DH is 4 months older than me. He stopped working at age 64 1/2, and I worked right up to age 65. DH didn’t draw SS until 65 and 8 months (we had money in our checking account that we could spend down before drawing his S). Waiting on his SS helped boost his payments - and for us it was a balance off of the time value of money. Starting to dray SS 8 months prior to full SS meant a little less per month check, but it kept our funds in our investments.
We had a low spending year in 2021 - and we turned on payments from our annuities as soon as DH started drawing his SS in 2022. That is what we set the annuities up - to provide our income stream in retirement.
My current check prior to Medicare B taken out is $1943.90; DH’s is $3637.90 before Medicare B taken out. My first payments were $1536 before Medicare B taken out (Oct 2021); DH’s first payments were $3078 before Medicare B taken out (March 2022). Cost of Living Adjustments have increased our SS payments. DH’s last paycheck was through the start of November 2020. I was able to pick up our health insurance for both of us through my employer, as I worked enough hours for it - that saved us over $1,000/month from COBRA insurance cost. DH needed to retire for his emotional health, and timing worked out as his 92 YO father died Dec 2020 and his 92 YO mother died March 2021 - DH spent a lot of time in their location (840 miles away), including being his mother’s caretaker 24/7 for periods as her caretaker had a stroke and died at home after hospitalization - mom was taken by our niece over Christmas/New Year’s holidays. On return, DH took care of her 24/7 until she needed hospitalization for UTI and DH came home. After he went back, they lined up for her to go into skilled care (where his dad had been) - she did great the first week, and then her meds stopped working for her - and she died the following week. DH was able to be at bedside as was two other brothers. She had hypertensive heart disease/heart failure. Over the past few years, she lost her filters and had some dementia. She wanted to stay in her home with DH being her caretaker 24/7 - and the family had to say, no he needed to be at his own home.
Surprising. It’s probably different for different customers. I received my Schwab 1099 consolidated on Feb 6th, and my Fidelity on Feb 7th. The only one I am missing is a fintech that emphasizes crypto and just started as a brokerage recently. There is no IRS penalty for late 1099-DA this year (if they claim to make a reasonable effort), so some of the ones that emphasize crypto instead of brokerage are being slow with their forms.
Full retirement age has been graduated but for my husband born in 1960 and myself who is younger, our full retirement age is 67.
If you draw before that, your benefits will be permanently reduced. Many file before their FRA but the rule for now is 67.
Benefits will rise until age 70, at that age, you will max out the amount of benefits you can receive
Social security can be complex but if you research and know what your options are, it will help
Yes, like @thumper1 I never thought the GPO/WEP would be repealed so I hadn’t looked at it until very recently.
Exactly. If I had a crystal ball back then, I would have waited to take SS until I was 65 (my FRA).
Well I spoke too soon. While we were in Florida, we had ice dams forming under the solar panels that were installed last year.
While we were in Florida, we visited with our friends – a retired university president – in the Longboat Key/Sarasota area. They told us that they have a lot of retired prominent academic friends in the area – plus they love the culture (opera, museums, etc.). We looked at the condo next to theirs, which will be coming up for sale, but it does not work for us. But, I think they were persuading ShawWife that it could be nicer than she thought and the elimination of the 5% MA tax and 16% MA estate tax could make a Florida house a lot less expensive.
Yes, SS is ‘fixed’ from the point of start and only rises with their assigned Cost Of Living Adjustments COLA. In the past, some may have had the resources (and perhaps pension starting) to retire at 62 when full SS retirement age was 65. Many do wait (and did wait) to retire until 65 for employer health insurance and to be able to begin Medicare at age 65. Even retiring, some wait to turn on SS until later. One definitely needs to look at the number. My wealthy brother didn’t start SS until age 70 (last September) because he said that it was providing a ‘guarantee’ of 8% - he was considering the hope that he would live long enough to cross the threshold of that being a good decision. He retired at age 60 and had health insurance at company rates until Medicare kicked in at age 65 (he was a co-owner of the company and had a buy out of his company shares). The problem with his QOL is he has a bedridden wife (13 years older than him) who didn’t have recommended surgery years ago (for spinal stenosis), and she also has COPD from smoking (and now is on 24/7 oxygen via nasal cannula.) Brother can only leave his area for short visits when her local daughters can live in. We know a relative that retired at 62 but is having to be thriftier in retirement - and maybe has a little remorse about not building up better retirement funds.
Would you need to sell in MA to ensure you are not subject to MA’s estate taxes? Or can this be achieved by ensuring that you live in Florida for more than half of the year?
I was just in the Sarasota area for a week and there is a lot of theater, art and culture there. If I were to move to Florida ( not happening with me), I would seriously consider that location.
There may be a time - some future time - when things will fall into place for you to have your own unique property in FL (or perhaps somewhere else) - and no longer have primary residency in MA. It was great that you explored the possibility with the condo that came up for sale.
There are primary things that have priority in our lives, and the order may change, variables may change, circumstances change.
I am hoping SIL does obtain a permanent job in his field in their current city when he processes out of the Army mid-April. He will continue with Army Reserves, and it sounds like he will be patient for an opening there - based on the feedback he has received from a lot of people he professionally is connected with. Once he is in a career position there and liking it, that is when we will get serious about making things ‘happen’ for us to relocate there. We are getting in a high demand single family housing area and with relatively low supply of homes in our price range, demand will go up and hopefully our selling price will be very good. That will help with getting the housing we want in new city w/o having real estate being a larger chunk of our portfolio.
@CT1417, we would not have to sell our residence in MA. However, switching tax domiciles is non-trivial, especially because states like MA, NY and CA are not eager to let high earners go and make it hard. The minimal criterion is that we could be in MA for fewer than 182 days or part days during the year. But that would not be sufficient. The states require that you really make it your primary residence. Your doctors, house of worship, voting registration, car registrations have to move to new state and also what they call other indicia of home – your favorite possessions. We would need to have a serious studio for ShawWife. I can easily move my company from MA to FL as it is essentially virtual at the moment.
If we spent 4 months (Dec-April), one month at our house in Canada, and a month traveling, plus some of my business travel, we would easily spend less than 6 months in MA. If ShawWife were to stay in MA, I don’t think we could make it work, but if she spends the 4 months in FL, it would.
The previous owners of our house also had a place in Key West and scruplously spent less than 6 months in MA. Their youngest daughter lived in the main part of the house with her husband and two children. We might be able to do the same with ShawD and her soon to be spouse.
The tax savings are meaningful but not life-altering, except in a year in which I got a large success fee, and probably not even then. MA estate tax savings could also be meaningful, but if we still owned the house, there would probably be MA estate tax due even if it were not our primary residence (although there might be clever ways to structure around that). We would not buy a house solely for the tax savings.
Massachusetts estate tax is brutal. Much to consider.
I think(?) the first $2M is exempt from MA estate tax. Others can correct if needed.
I wouldn’t move states just to save in taxes. ( I live in a high tax state). That’s me.
And, unpopular opinion: if you can afford to own 2 homes you can afford to pay your taxes.