7 Reasons to Claim Social Security EARLY!

The internet is packed with confident Social Security advice, but a lot of it collapses the moment you apply the real rules. We dig into why the “just claim at 62” message spreads, what parts of it are true, and where it can flat-out mislead you, especially for married couples trying to coordinate benefits. With Peak 65 underway and millions of Americans hitting Medicare and retirement decision points, getting this right can mean the difference between stable retirement income and years of avoidable stress.

We break down Part 1 of a two-part guide: seven reasons you might consider claiming Social Security early. That includes funding your go-go years, making a decision based on health and family longevity, and understanding how spousal benefits actually work when someone files before full retirement age. We also unpack why “break-even math” is not a complete strategy, and why your start date should connect to a bigger retirement income plan that accounts for real life, not perfect forecasts.

Then we go into the part many people miss: taxes and Medicare. Social Security taxation hinges on provisional income, and once required minimum distributions (RMDs) begin, the combination of IRA withdrawals and benefits can push you into higher tax exposure and IRMAA Medicare premium surcharges. If you want a claiming strategy that holds up under scrutiny, you need to see how Social Security, tax planning, spousal planning, and survivor benefits fit together.

If you found this helpful, subscribe for Part 2, share this with someone nearing 62, and leave a review with the one Social Security question you want answered next.

To learn more about Brad Pistole and the Ozark Retirement Group, please visit www.ozarksretirement.com 

Transcript

Welcome And Why Brad Shows Up

SPEAKER_02 0:11

Welcome to Safe Money Radio with your host, Brad Pistol. Brad is a retirement income and tax planning certified professional, primarily serving clients in the Midwest, but he's sought after nationally for his expertise in helping people secure their retirements. Mr. Pistol is a licensed life insurance professional in approximately 20 different states, and he specializes in working with people who are near retirement and those who have already retired with wealth management, income planning, and asset protection strategies using life, health, long-term care, and annuity insurance products. And now, here to talk with you about securing your retirement, it's your host, Brad Pistol.

Peak 65 And The Stakes

How To Contact Brad

New Training And Better Reports

Brad’s Personal Social Security Story

Why Most Online Advice Misleads

Seven Reasons To Claim Early

Fund Your Go Go Years

Health And Family Longevity

Spousal Benefits And Real Math

Taxes IRMAA And RMD Traps

Bridging To A Higher Spousal Check

Survivor Strategy For Couples

When You Need The Money Now

Closing Thoughts And Next Show

SPEAKER_00 1:03

Well, hello everyone. Thank you so much for joining us again today for Safe Money Radio. We've been right here every single week in the Ozarks on radio since 2010. And this might be the first time you've ever listened, or maybe you're listening to a podcast, but just know this. We've aired more than 800 episodes of this show. Like I said, going back about 16 years now. We love what we do. There is not only a radio program, but a podcast, and we release new videos every single week. So if you're listening to the radio right now and you didn't know there was a podcast, or vice versa, you can just always go to YouTube and you can type in Brad Pistol and find hundreds of videos about every financial planning topic that exists under the sun. We're blessed to have lots of incredible nationally known guests on the show. And virtually every other week we're going to have a guest on the show, someone who's an expert in the field of finance or social security planning, retirement income planning, you name it, tax planning. We've had them all on. And so we're grateful that you're joining us today. And I will tell you this there's a reason why I'm in my office on a Saturday during the middle of March Madness recording a radio program at 1.30 in the afternoon. That's because it's an exciting time. You know, there's so many things that are happening. Of course, the whole world is consumed with the war and AI, and is AI going to take over all industries? I mean, hey, every commercial under the sun is just give your$20 to an AI program and they'll do the investing for you. You don't need humans, and I know better than that. And so, you know, being blessed to be a premier financial planner across the United States. We have clients in more than 20 states. And yesterday I was helping clients in Texas who are selling a business. We've been working with them for three years, and everything kind of came to a head yesterday. And so I was here late on a Friday night. And then today, you know, this morning, I was helping clients in Tennessee who are in the process of a lifelong transition from owning very successful businesses into the world of the unknown. How do I retire? How do I take these assets and these retirement dollars and turn it into guaranteed lifetime income when I've been self-employed and I've had high income coming in my whole life? And that's what we do every single day for people all across the country. And it drives me, it makes me want to stay on top, be in the cutting edge of premier planners all across the country. And that's why I now have six different financial designations. And the newest designation from the National Association of Registered Social Security Analysts that both myself and Kinsley on our staff have gone through that program, that's what drives today's show. And so I'll just tell you this if you're listening for the first time, I'll give you a warning, a heads up. You know, for the next probably five to six weeks, we're going to be talking a lot about Social Security and income planning. And there's a reason why. You know, we are in the middle of what is known as Peak 65. What is Peak 65? Well, it started in 2024, and my good friend, Dr. Jason Fickner, who actually was in the Social Security program under the Bush and Obama administration, he was number two in charge of the Social Security Administration and programming. No one knows more about Social Security planning than Dr. Jason Fickner. He is the one that coined the phrase that has done all kinds of articles and interviews about something known as Peak 65. We've had him on the show, so you can just go to YouTube, type in Brad Pistol, Jason Fickner, you can watch the interviews. But here's what Peak 65 is. There are currently 11,200 people a day turning age 65 every single day. Now, I know it's easy to hear numbers thrown at you and just kind of forget about what that means. It's just another number, another stat, but think about this for a minute. 11,200 people a day all the way through next year, 2027, that's more than 4.1 million people a year who are turning age 65. So why is Social Security and income planning important? Well, guess what happens at age 65? Most people, you know, you've got 11,200 people a day on average turning 65. All these culminating life events are happening at age 65. For a lot of people, in their brain, they've been told 65 means number one, you retire. Number two, you go on to Medicare. And number three, you start claiming your Social Security benefits if you haven't already. And so that's the common mental thread that's going on with people. Age 65, it's time to slow down, it's time to not work anymore. You go from your traditional health insurance plan at work on to Medicare, and then you trigger your Social Security and live happily ever after. And so you've got four million people a year all across the country thinking about this. And because of YouTube, and because every dog and pony under the sun has a podcast now, including 20 and 22-year-old kids who are on TikTok giving you their 90-second advice as a 20-year-old about when and how you should file your Social Security, has everyone developing all these opinions about when and how they should file. And friends, I've just got to tell you, I've always known a lot about Social Security just because it's what we do in retirement income planning. You know, I've I've been through the RICP and the TPCP programs through the American College, and so I'll come back to that here in a minute. So I've always known a lot about Social Security, but until I recently went through the registered Social Security Analyst Program, which is 100% about Social Security planning, that's it was just recently whenever I realized it's not only a big deal, it's a really, really big deal. So if you're listening right now and you're one of these 11,200 people turning 65 this year, or you're in the 10 plus thousand people who are around age 58, 59, 60, and this decision is coming right down the road for you, or maybe you filed within the last 12 months. If you did, you want to keep listening because you can change your decision in the first 12 months. If you've made a mistake or you've gotten some bad advice, you might want to keep listening. But today we are ultimately going to talk about part one of a two-part show, which is seven reasons to consider claiming your social security benefits early, a very popular decision right now. About 40% of people claim early. We're going to talk about why they do. But we're also in the next show going to talk about seven reasons why you should wait beyond age 62 and file at either your full retirement age or perhaps all the way up to the maximum of age 70. So that's what we're going to be talking about on the show today. Just in case you're listening for the first time, I want to give a quick shout out to our phone number, our website, so you can keep in contact with us. You know, one of the things that's changed over the years of having hosted the show is that I know I listen to a lot of podcasts. You probably do too if you're listening right now to News Talk Radio or to podcasting. I don't love it when commercials come on. Of course, on this show, we don't have anyone sponsor us. I do that purposely. I don't want to spend 15 minutes of every 60-minute show talking about gold or silver or gun safes or life insurance or why you need to buy this or that. So we just don't do it. We pay for all of this ourselves for a reason. We want to keep the information coming to you and we don't want to be sidetracked by commercials. So we've really changed the show a lot recently to where we're going to give you a shout-out for a phone number, how you can reach out and contact us, but then we're just going to keep on rolling with the information because I think that's what our clients want, that's what our listeners want. And we do have a lot of financial professionals that listen to the show and are subscribed to the podcast too. So just know this. If we're saying some things today and you want more information, especially a free customized Social Security report that we're going to be talking about later, you can always call us at 866-780 SAFE. That's 866-780-7233. Or I think this is the easiest way. If you've got access either on your phone or to a computer, just go to our website, which is Ozarksretirement.com. That's Ozarksretirement.com. Click on the contact us button. I will personally get back in touch with you. You can say, hey, Brad, I've listened to your show, I've listened to the podcast. I would like to talk to you. Call me, email me, give me some dates and times, and I will reach out to you. Because we want to make sure that you are able to develop a safe and secure retirement income plan that lasts the rest of your life. That's why I wrote a best-selling book about it. And it's been very, very popular. You know, I wrote the book back in 2021. I get deposits every single week from Amazon, from people who are still buying the book, buying the audio book, and listening to the information. It's resonated with listeners all across the country, and there's a reason why. We live in a time of war. We live in a time of change. We live in a time of waking up and maybe AI is going to outsource all of our jobs. We may lose our career. People feel uneasy. They feel nervous. And so we want to make sure that all of our listeners have accurate information, not opinions. We're going to talk about that a lot in these next couple of segments. But we want to talk about accurate information from educated financial professionals, not just someone who took a test 30 years ago and they've been selling product, stocks, bonds, mutual funds, annuities, life insurance, and haven't stuck their nose in a book in 30 years other than doing some CE here and there. We want you to hear information from people who study ongoing. Friends, I have six different financial designations. I have like 80 hours of CE I have to do every single year to keep all of these different designations active and valid. So I am constantly studying, which is why there's a lot of nights and weekends and Saturdays at one o'clock recording radio shows. My brain is in this stuff all the time. So today, we are going to be talking about the importance of your social security decisions, when and how you file, if you're married, if you're single, if you're divorced, if you're widowed, all of these different possibilities that are here and not just some pie in the sky generic examples like you'll see on all the videos on YouTube. We're going to get into specifics. And I've already recorded a couple of videos about seven reasons to claim early, seven reasons to file later. And I have a lot of charts and graphs and numbers in these. So you can go to YouTube later and just type in those titles and watch the videos that are actually dedicated to that. I'm somewhat limited on the podcast and the and radio show because you can't see the information in front of you. But if you go to YouTube and go search out our videos, you can watch all the physical information in front of you. So let's do this. Let's get started. Like I said before, if you need our help, just go to Ozarksretirement.com, click on the contact us button, and you can find all the information about every financial planning topic under the sun that you want to learn more about. So, like I said before earlier in the show, early in 2026, both Kinsley and I, Kinsley's on our staff here, she's our Medicare specialist. We both decided to participate in the National Association of Registered Social Security Analysts, the designation program that was being offered through the American College. I already had my RICP, Retirement Income Certified Professional Designation, and I was the first, I know was in the first two or three people in the United States to get the tax planning certified professional designation, TPCP. That started in 2025, and it's one of the fastest growing financial designation programs in the country. And both of those programs, RICP and TPCP, had sections in them about Social Security. RICP was more of the income planning, when and how to file, strategies, claiming decisions. And then TPCP was the tax side. As many of you who are learning about Social Security planning, or maybe you're already on Social Security, you've learned, uh oh, they could actually come in and tax up to 50% or 85% of a benefit that's already been taxed. And it ticks people off as it should. It should be criminal to do that, but our country does it. Thank you, Congress. And so I studied those two things in RICP and TPCP. But then when the NARSSA program came out, I thought, boy, this is a deep dive into Social Security. And with four million people a year turning, age 65, 11,200 people a day, I want to make sure that I know this stuff inside and out. So this is what was covered in the NARSSA program. Social Security income planning, Social Security benefits, the future of Social Security, spousal benefits, family and dependent benefits, claiming considerations, disability, the taxation of Social Security benefits, pensions and Social Security, Medicare, Social Security income planning, how to work with clients through their claiming decisions, the big picture, the taxation of retirement income, how to help self-employed business owners working with the self-employed, and how to use the registered Social Security Analyst Software, which is the most robust, incredible planning software I have ever seen. And so I'm so grateful to have made it through that program, passed all the tests and exams to have that certification, for Kinsley to have that certification. And now at any time, anyone can call us and say, hey, we want to sit down with you and have a custom tailored report. We want to see the four different best ways to file for Social Security. And based on our situation, with all that knowledge, we'll make the decision that's best for us. And so we have that capability now. That's a part of our strong suit. And you can call us anytime, 866-780-7233, or just go to the website, ozarksretirement.com, click on contact us and say, hey, I want a free consultation. I need to talk about Social Security Planning. And Kinsley and I will be able to help you with that. And we'll do that for you free of charge. So just reach out to us anytime. But before we jump into what the rest of the show will be on, and I will tell you, it's going to be a lot. Seven reasons to consider claiming your social security benefits early. I'm going to tell you a personal story. And if you are listening for the first time, or maybe you subscribe to the podcast, you may not know this about my background and my history, but I will tell you why this stuff is so interesting to me. Because you see, I will tell people in my previous life, I was in full-time youth and family ministry. I was a pastor, a youth minister. So a lot of people don't know this, but when you first enter into the world of ministry, when you're credentialed, when you become a pastor, you have a two-year window in which you can choose to conscientiously object to Social Security. You can say, I don't want to participate. Don't withhold that from my check. And so as a 19-year-old, a Bible major in college who got offered a job at his hometown church, who went home and they were telling me, hey, you've got to decide about this social security thing. Hey, I was 19. I didn't know anything about money or finance. And so I did what all wise 19-year-olds would do. I went and asked someone much older than me to one of my favorite preachers of all time, our preacher at that time, A.W. Chisholm, God rest his soul. And I said, AW, they're talking to me about this Social Security stuff. I don't know what to do. Should I opt out? What does it even mean when you opt out? Should I pay in? And A.W. Chisholm said something that I've never forgotten. That's why I'm talking about it now at age 54, after 20 years of financial planning with clients all across the country. He said, You know, this is a great choice for someone in ministry. He said, You can probably be a better steward of your money than the government can. What a great line that was. And he said, if you believe that you can be, and I believe that you can be, and I believe it's your spiritual responsibility to be a better steward of your money than the government, then you should opt out. And I thought through that, and of course, that was part one of what he told me. So I want to deal with part one first. I thought, you know, I like that idea because here's the thing, friends, those of you listening right now, we want to talk about the good old days. Well, here's the good old days in the world of Brad Pistol. I was first hired as an intern at the church for one year. The pay was fifty, two hundred dollars a year. Those of you who are good at math, that's$100 a week.$52 weeks,$5,200 a year,$100 a week. That doesn't go very far. I didn't love the idea of having Social Security deductions come out of my check. Then I got married, and they offered me a full-time position, and I made a whopping$11,200 in year one. Now, there was a parsonage house there involved with the church, and I did get to live in that house rent-free. That's how I was able to survive. But let's just do some math for a minute.$11,200 a year, make sure I said that right early.$11,200 a year divided by$12, that's$933 a month. That was my gross, really gross take-home pay. So I did this huge step up from$5,200 a year to$11,200 a year. And I've got one of these weird brains when it comes to math and other details. I like don't forget anything math related. I know the numbers on my driver's license. I know social security numbers, me, my kids, family members. I don't forget things. And so believe it or not, but all the way back in 1992, I remember what my car payments were when I was first married. It was$210.67 a month for my truck. It was$183.05 a month for my little Honda civic hatchback. And friends, that's$393.72 a month of a$933 a month payment. How in the world did I survive? That's$42% of my income that was on cars. Well, obviously wasn't listening to the guru about debt back then, uh, Mr. Ramsey, because he would have said you have way too much money in your cars. Well, they were really cheap cars, but anyway, that's what it is. It is what it is. My pay was$933.33 a month.$393 of that was on car payments. And oh yeah, don't forget the insurance. When you throw in insurance, which would have been at least$50 a car back then, young drivers under the age of 25, that would have been 52% of my income was just on my cars and the insurance. What about food and gas and electricity and clothing and entertainment and any kind of other bills that you have? I don't know how in the world I made it. So the point is when A.W. Chisholm said you can be a better steward of your money than the government can, I took that deal. I opted out of Social Security at age 19. And from age 19 until age 36, as a full-time pastor, I never paid into the system. So there's all these wivetales about how your benefit is derived, and you know, that's your highest five years, it's your highest 10 years, it's dependent upon the weather and the temperature on a Thursday afternoon, the year you retire. I've heard crazy stuff. But those things aren't true. What is factual is that it's your highest 35 years of earnings. So you do have to have 40 uh credits to qualify for your own benefit, and it's your top 35 years of earnings. Well, here's the thing in my own personal situation. I have zeros from age 19 to age 36. Now, I had a few little jobs when I was a teenager. I don't even know whether or not I qualified for enough credits then, if I worked enough or made enough of that to happen. But I know that for me to have 35 years in which there are no zeros, I would have to work all the way to age 72 to erase all the zeros. Now, you can't work past age 70 when it comes to Social Security claiming. That's the max age. So no matter what I do, even though I'm in the highest tax bracket, I hit the highest numbers, I think the highest Social Security uh benefits, like$4,300 a month. I'm still going to have some zeros on my record, even if I work all the way to age 70. And so what we're going to be talking about on the show today is everyone's situation is different. A lot of you listening right now may be thinking, well, how in the world did you get into financial planning? Well, that's a whole other story. I did have a father who was 52 years in the business. My son's an advisor. My father was an advisor. My daughter works for a financial advisor in Kansas City. My son-in-law is going through the process of becoming an advisor right now. It is a family business. But I can tell you this: the Social Security side of things is very, very important. And I pay attention because I'm self-employed. So I pay in the full 15.3% for myself. No employers matching anything. If you want to know how they derive at all these numbers, well, it's 6.2% of your pay for Social Security, it's 1.45% for Medicare. When you add those two together, it's 7.65% for the employed people listening right now. But if you're self-employed, you pay double that. So it's the 6.2 plus 1.45 times 2. 15.3% of everything that I make up to the threshold limit is going to be taxed. And I'm going to pay into that system to maybe or maybe not get that back in the future. Do you think this stuff is important to me? It's very, very important to me. Here's the thing I know this from for those of you listening right now. Social Security is the number one financial asset used in retirement for about 63% of you listening right now. Now, I'm in a situation where thankfully I want Social Security. I would love to get back from all the tens and hundreds of thousands of dollars I will have paid into it by the time I'm retirement age, but I won't need it for my retirement income. I've saved my money outside of that system to live on. But most of you didn't have that choice or that option. Your 401k and you're paying into Social Security is how you live. 63% of you are going to have to rely on a maximized Social Security claiming benefit because it's what you've got. It's the majority of what you've got. And so I want to make sure that you make the right decision when it comes to you and your family. As we keep rolling, we're going to be talking about how you can start claiming at age 62 all the way up to age 70, and that dependent upon your situation, which involves all kinds of things health, wealth, the age of your spouse, whether or not you're married or divorced, do you have dependent children? Do you have a disabled child? You got all these factors that are there. And trust me on this, if you go to YouTube and type in when and how to claim for Social Security, you're going to get thousands of opinions. And I've watched at I've watched at least 200 videos on it. And what I find out is that about 95% of the time, those videos have inaccurate information in it. So people are listening to it. And one of the most famous ones from this last week that I watched has had more than 1.4 million views. And then I read the comments and go, wow, I get where people are coming from. I read these comments. Now some of them are bots, of course, but I read these comments and I get it. People are tired, they're tired of working, they think Social Security is going bankrupt. They want to start as early as they can, they're ready to move into their retirement years. But a lot of the information they're getting from people about when and how to file is based on completely false information. So, friends, make sure you're listening to and working with a registered Social Security analyst, someone who has gone through the training, the education, to know what they're talking about, to give you book, chapter, and verse where you've got it on paper in front of you, the rules, the claiming strategies. That's what we do for our clients. So when we come back from this quick break, we're going to be talking about seven reasons to consider claiming your social security benefits early. And then in the next show, we're going to be talking about seven reasons why you might want to wait. So call us anytime, 866-780-7233. Or you can just go to our website, ozarksretirement.com, click on the contact us button. Friends, thank you so much for joining us today. It's time to jump into what I've been promising the first part of the show, and that is seven reasons to consider claiming your social security benefits early. Now I'll say right up from the from the get-go, it would be better for a lot of you maybe to go to YouTube and type this in and watch this video because you can see the numbers and the charts that I'll refer to. On the audio version, whether it's the podcast or you're listening on radio, we're obviously not going to have that information in front of you. You're just listening. So you can go watch this, just go to YouTube and type it in. Seven reasons to consider claiming your social security benefits early. So let's do it. You know, when it comes to retirement, one of the most common questions I get asked is when and how should I file for this benefit? And it's a great question because your social security benefit is often your largest retirement asset. It is the case about 63% of the time. Now, I hear everything under the sun these days. I hear all kinds of things like this. Oh, you should definitely file for your benefit the day you turn 62. Everyone should do it. Haven't you seen all the information out there about Social Security? It's going to be insolvent. It's going to be bankrupt by 2033. So listen, they're telling you up front that they're going broke. Take your money and run while you still can. That's a common one. It's misinformation. There's some truth in it, but it's not total truth. It's just only being able to share part of what's real and then tying it all together in an argument, and it's not true. In other shows coming up in the next few weeks, I'm going to talk about the true solvency of Social Security, what will happen in 2020, 2033 if things don't happen to correct it, but it's not going bankrupt. So we'll talk more about it. Here's another one. Another famous opinion. Filing for your Social Security benefits is all about the break-even point. You just need to find out your break-even point. So just, you know, do the math and find out when, if you would have lived to a certain age, it would benefit you to have filed at 62 versus 67 and on and on. And that's great. I've had a very famous video online with Heather Schreiber about the breakeven point. It's been viewed by more than 20,000 people. It's what's on everyone's mind. What is the break-even point for me? And the answer is it's different for every single person, and no one knows when they're going to die. So you're guessing if you say, well, I'm going to file now because my breakeven point's going to be at XYZ. Well, you don't know when you're going to die. You don't know when your spouse is going to die. So you can't know the break even point without knowing the date of your death. Here's another one. Did you know that there's an 8% increase in your benefit for every year that you delay your benefit? So everyone should wait until they're 70 to get the max benefit because after all, that's what passes on to the surviving spouse. And yes, that is correct. But should everyone wait till age 70? Well, probably not. If you go on and read Social Security comments on videos, which as a matter of fact, I have one pulled up right now. This is one of the big videos that's out that has more than a million views. And here are some of the comments. Well, I took mine at 62. It makes life easier. You can't buy time. Life gets physically harder as you get older, so I'm going to enjoy my money now. Every day is Saturday. Here's another one. Well, I had a heart attack at 61. Four years, four months later, my brother died at 58, and my dad died at 63. My grandfather died at 66, and my mother at 83. So no one knows when their time is going to come. I'm taking mine now. And if you just read on and on and on and on throughout comments, there is a majority of people right now who believe in the taking it early time frame. So let me give you seven quick reasons why it might be in your best interest to take your benefit early. Let's jump in and do it, and then we'll do another video about why you might want to wait. Here we go. Reason number one that you might want to file for your Social Security benefits at age 62, right when you can. The answer is you simply are ready to retire and fund your go-go years. You know, my good friend Tom Hegna, who's been a guest on the show many times, has a book, Don't Worry, Retire Happy. And he talks about the three main phases of retirement. The first phase is the go-go phase. Now it's in this phase of retirement, which is normally your mid to early 60s, that you go, go, go and do all the things that you would have wanted to do when you were working, but you couldn't because you were working and you were married and you were raising a family, you had relationships to pay attention to. So the first reason you might consider triggering your benefit early is so that you can enjoy what you've waited so long to enjoy and you want to do that while you can. Because phase two and phase three, you've got the go-go years, but then you have the slow-go years, and then you have the no-go years. And for a lot of people, they choose to delay the benefit because they want it to be higher, and then something happens in their life to a spouse or to themselves, or to maybe they start taking care of aging parents, and they jump from the go-go straight into the slow-go or the no-go, and then they can't even enjoy the money, the higher paycheck. So, you know, the go-go years, reason number one, that might be the time where you say, Hey, let's go do all the things on our bucket list, let's take vacations, let's go out with the grandkids, let's do all these fun things. And I'm just tired. I'm just, the working world is crazy, and I think we can afford it. I've done the math, we've got our house paid off, we've got our cars paid off. Let's take the money now and let's go enjoy the go-go years. And there's certainly nothing wrong with that if you can afford to do it. So that would be reason number one. Here's reason number two for filing early: your personal health and family history. You see, the truth is your family history, current and past health issues, and other factors should not be ignored. Due to several conditions, living to age 80 or beyond might not be a realistic thing for you or your spouse. If that's the case, filing for your benefits at age 62 or before your full retirement age is probably a good decision. It might even be a necessary reality. You see, every month that you wait past age 62 is a month that you're gambling with your own mortality and lifetime income. So you need to take a long look at your family history and you need to ask yourself: did your parents or your grandparents live past age 85? Do you have health issues, things like diabetes or heart disease or other chronic health conditions? Now, if the answer is no, my parents died in their 60s and 70s, I've had health issues, my husband's had a heart attack. No one in our family has ever lived beyond age 82. You might want to file early. That it says statistics are on your side. So it's not just financial planning factors that are involved here, it's a lot of physical factors. Hey, if your doctor or your family history or your gut says you're not living past 75, then delaying your Social Security benefits is probably a financial mistake. Predictions about life expectancy these days are pretty accurate. There's a reason why life insurance companies and annuity companies pay these people, these actuaries, the math nerds, the highest salaries. They pay attention to statistical data about how long we're living, and it very rarely lies. So you need to ask yourself when it comes to reason number two, your personal health and family history, would you rather live on a smaller paycheck for 15 to 20 years, or would you want to live off a larger check for maybe only seven to 10 years? Because that's what's going to happen in the difference. If you start early, you're and you live to age, say, 80, then you're going to receive more paychecks of a smaller amount, and maybe that's what you want. So let's jump into reason number three: spousal benefits. Did you know that your spouse is eligible for spousal benefits, but they cannot collect them until you file for your benefits? Now, while this is true, this is where I hear a lot of inaccurate information out there. There's a video out there right now with more than a million views, and they use this example of one spouse having a certain amount of a benefit and the other spouse having a benefit. And if they filed, how they can go and claim for half of the spousal benefit, and it automatically jumps up to half of the higher income earner's benefit. And they're wrong in every way in this video. Every way. They're saying the 62-year-old can file for half of the spousal benefit. That's not true. There's a reduction formula that does not give them the full 50%. There's all kinds of things. They say that uh Social Security will automatically switch you to the higher benefit when you turn full retirement age. That's not true. And so you want to make sure that when it comes to spousal benefits and planning, that you get accurate information. So let me give you a quick example here. Let's say, in this example, the higher earning spouse has a$1,200 benefit at age$62, and the lower earning spouse has a$400 benefit at age$2. In this example, if the lower earning spouse filed for their own benefit at age 62, at the same time that the higher earning spouse files for their own benefit, the lower earning spouse would receive a total monthly benefit of$540. Now I want to stop right there for a minute because some of you, you know this already. Your spouse with the higher benefit has to file first. You can't file for a spousal benefit if they haven't. But if they file and their benefit's$1,200 and yours is$400, a lot of people think, well, it steps up to$600. I get 50% of their benefit once they file. That's not true. You get 50% of the benefit once they've reached full retirement age, once you've reached full retirement age. But you're filing at age 62. So then you have to go into all these charts and graphs and reduction formulas, which on the video online, if you're listening right now, you can go watch. I actually have the charts for the reductions. So the actual math on this situation works like this. The lower earning spouse would step up from 400 to 540. Not the 800 a month that a lot of times is talked about in other videos, but here's the thing: this is important to note. The spousal benefit consists of their own retirement benefit paid first. If their benefit was 400, they received their own benefit first. And then they get what's called a spousal top off of$140 a month. How did they determine the$140? Well, they have to first determine the full spousal benefit, which would have been this$1,200 benefit for the higher earner. What was their full retirement age benefit? That's what they're going to go off of. So they're going to develop, they're going to come up with the PIA, then they're going to calculate the spousal top off and talk about whether or not it's reduced or unreduced based on whether or not you filed at age 62 or your own full retirement age. Then they're going to apply that early filing reduction, and then they're going to come up with your total benefit. Now, if you just got completely lost by listening to all that, that's okay. So does the people who even study this stuff. It's hard to keep up with. I'll just say this. On number three, the third reason why you might want to consider filing early is because of a spousal benefit. In this case, if they're both 62, one spouse files, freeing up the spousal benefit for the other 62-year-old. Remember, that's money that's that's free to them to take, they can start taking that income. And in this case, which was$560 a month, that's$6,720 a year in income to that 62-year-old receiving the spousal benefit. If they were doing that for five more years, because the other option would be, well, let's wait all the way up to my full retirement age of 67, they wouldn't have received$6,720 a year for five years. That's$33,600 in income between ages 62 and 67. So in some cases, based on life, health, longevity, uh, heart attacks, diabetes, strokes, other issues that are there, family history, it might be in your benefit to take that additional$33,600 instead of waiting all the way until your full retirement age. So that was a lot of information, but again, I go into full detail on this on YouTube watching the video. Here's reason number four for why you might want to consider filing for your benefit early. Beating Uncle Sam to the punch. Tax planning. Here's the thing. As many of you probably know, especially if you're already on Social Security, Social Security benefits aren't automatically taxed like your paycheck was. Whether or not you pay taxes on them depends on what your total income is from many other sources. Social Security uses something called provisional income, which is your taxable income plus half of your Social Security benefit. If that total is under$25,000 for a single person or$32,000 for a married filing jointly person, then your Social Security income is probably going to be 100% tax-free. You've already paid the taxes on it. But notice those numbers weren't very high. If you file now and you get$1,200 a month in Social Security benefits, you might receive this money completely tax-free. But if you waited until your full retirement age or all the way up to the max age of 70, the chances of your Social Security benefits being tax-free is really small. And I'll tell you why. If you choose to delay and not take your benefit, but you're ready to retire, you're probably going to take the money that you need to live on from another source. And that's probably going to be a 401k or an IRA, something like that. And while it's great to help combat your inflation in later years, it also means that you'll be increasing your taxable income once you start taking your distribution. So there's always the which do I pull from first? Do I start taking from my 401ks and my IRAs now in my early retirement years while I let my Social Security delay? Or do I start my Social Security now and let those roll up? Well, if you let them roll up, you're going to have a tax issue on down the road because they're going to get, in theory, bigger and bigger and bigger. And then when you start taking out those distributions, it's going to affect the taxation of your Social Security benefits. So remember, there's this thing called required minimum distributions that begin at either age 73 currently or age 75 for anyone born in 1960 or later. And those distributions from those tax-deferred accounts will be 100% taxable. This will increase your modified adjusted gross income, and this can make up to 85% of your Social Security benefit taxable. So this is something that you need to pay attention to because in the middle of all of that, you've also heard me do all these shows on IRMA. I've had Paul Morrison on the show. I've had Mark Anisi on the show. I've had Heather Schreiber on the show talking about IRMA, income-related monthly adjustment amounts. And that's when your income thresholds as a single or married filing jointly person cross thresholds and you're making too much money from the IRA and the 401k and the Social Security, and that makes your Medicare premium get the stealth tax. You step into higher categories. Hey, premiums can be anywhere from 202 a month all the way up to 600 plus a month. So it's a big deal. So I go into this in greater detail on the video, but reason number four is beating the tax man to the punch. It might be better to trigger your Social Security benefit early and keep your income lower so that you stay under these taxable thresholds of 50 and 85%. A lot of people feel like, hey, it should be a crime to tax my Social Security. You've already taxed it. I agree 100%. But trust me, until Congress changes things, and I don't think they will, we're$39 trillion in debt at the time of this recording. By the time it plays, we might be$40 trillion in debt. They're not going to scroll back or lower the taxation of these benefits. They need the money. So we got to beat the tax man every way that we can. Here's reason number five. You might want to consider filing for your social security benefit early. Building a bridge to a bigger spousal benefit. Now, as we've talked about on other shows, when you claim your Social Security benefit, you're entitled to your own benefit or up to 50% of your spouse's benefit. It's whichever one is higher. But there are several rules, which we've already talked about, that determine what that specific amount will be. So I'll give you a quick example here. And again, you can go watch this on the video on YouTube. But let's say you only worked part-time. Maybe you were a stay-at-home parent, and as a result, you earned less over your career when compared to your spouse's income. Because of this, let's say your benefit at age 62 is$800 a month, but your spouse's benefit at their full retirement age is$3,000 a month. If you file for your benefit at age$20 for$800 a month, then you are dead. Deemed to have applied for both your own benefit and any potential spousal benefit. Since your spouse hasn't filed, remember they have to file first for you to get the benefit. You would just continue receiving$800 per month until they file for their own benefit. But remember, if you claim at$62, your spousal benefit will be reduced to roughly 32.5% of your spouse's full retirement benefit rather than the 50% that everyone talks about. There are reduction formulas for this if you start before your full retirement age. So in this case, once your spouse files for their own benefit of$3,000 a month at their full retirement age, your benefit could increase from the$800 a month when you filed to approximately$1,050 per month. Now, how did I come up with the$1,050? Why isn't it$1,500, half of the$3,000? That's because of the special spousal top-off and early reduction formulas that we talked about. And if you'll go watch the video, you'll actually see the charts that show these reductions. So many videos out there that say it's an automatic 50% of your spouse's benefit when they file. That is not true. It depends on when you filed, it depends on so many other factors. And so you have to take into consideration the spousal top off, which is based on the early reductions formula and whether or not you filed at your full retirement age. Okay. We've got two more things to discuss. Is your head spinning yet? Well, just remember, you can always go to Ozarksretirement.com. Just go to Ozarksretirement.com and click on contact us, and we can sit down with you and customize a Social Security planning report for you and your family. Now let's jump into reason number six, which might be the reason why you file for your benefits early. It's the survivor benefit strategy. You see, when the first spouse passes away, you will retain the highest of the two retirement benefits. In other words, if your spouse passes away first and they had the higher benefit, you will keep their monthly benefit and you will lose your own. Let's take a quick look at an example about how this would work. Let's say you're eligible for$800 a month at age 62, but your spouse had a substantially higher income during their career. So their amount, like I said earlier, is$3,000 a month at their full retirement age. If your spouse is older than you and they have health concerns, this is definitely a reason that you might want to think about this move to file early. Here's why. For each year that they defer beyond their full retirement age, this adds 8% to their future benefit. In other words, if their primary insurance amount, known as the PIA, is$3,000 a month at age 67 and they wait all the way to age 70 to claim, their benefit would increase to roughly$3,720 a month. That's$3,000 a month times a 24% increase because it's 8% per year for waiting to age 68, 8% for age 69, 8% for age 70. It's 24% more. So they would increase in their benefit from$3,000 a month to$3,720 a month. Why is that important? Well, let's say you did this. You claimed early at 62, they waited to age 70, and then life happens and they die right after they retire retire at age 71. God forbid, but it happens every day. In this scenario, you would have been collecting money from age 62 all the way up to that point. And then upon the death of your spouse, you would step out of your benefit and into theirs. So in other words, if they did unfortunately pass away right after they retired, but they took the max benefit by waiting all the way to age 70, they would have increased their benefit from 3,000 a month to$3,720 a month. You would have been receiving$800 a month, that's$9,600 a year from the time you turn$62 all the way up to their passing. And then you would step over into their$3,720 a month benefit. So in this claiming strategy, you get more now in your earlier years when you can enjoy it the most. And then you will get the maximum po possible income later as a survivor benefit. If you waited all the way to your full retirement age to start your own benefit, you would have missed out on five years of$800 a month,$9,600 a year, because once it's gone, it's gone. So knowing your own family history and background and benefits, that can help determine, especially when there's a big gap between your benefit and theirs. It can show you when and how to file and to claim. Now let's do this. Let's give you one more reason as we wrap up the show today. Reason number seven that you might want to consider claiming your Social Security benefits early. And I really want you to listen to this one. Here it is. Reason number seven, you simply need the money now. You know, there's a four-letter word in our vocabulary that never lies. That word is math. Math doesn't lie. And with the endless numbers of possible combinations for when and how to claim your Social Security benefits, it can be overwhelming. But even if you were able to guess the absolute best claiming strategy for you and your family, because you magically know the day that both you and your spouse are going to die, even then, sometimes the math doesn't matter. Life is what matters. And as you've probably figured out by now, we only get one life. So we might as well make the most of it while we're here. You see, it's impossible to know, my friends, what the future is going to hold. You don't know what's going to happen during your golden years, but I can tell you this there will be all kinds of unknowns that you're going to have to face. There will be health issues, family issues, financial issues, tax issues, inflation issues, issues with war and things that are going on around you, and many, many more. So for many of you listening right now, you might simply decide that in today's world of unknowns, you're ready to retire and enjoy your life right now. And you know what? If that's the case, there's nothing wrong with that. Social Security is an insurance program that you paid into for decades. And you shouldn't miss out on life by trying to squeeze every single ounce of juice out of the lemon that you possibly can. You might want to squeeze it right now while you still can. Remember, the next show is going to be about seven reasons why you might want to consider delaying the benefit, the opposite end of today's show. So the bottom line is this whether you choose to file for Social Security at age 62, age 65, or somewhere else in between, live the life of your dreams. Live it to the fullest and enjoy every minute of it. Friends, I've been hosting this show for 16 years now. I love what I do. If I can ever help you in any way with your financial planning, if I can help you by running a customized Social Security report, just let us know. Just go to Ozarksretirement.com and click on the contact us button. Well, I'm about out of time, and I would like to thank you for listening to Safe Money Radio. If you're serious about your financial future, give me a call, and together we'll get your retirement savings on the fast track to accumulation while reducing exposure to market losses. Thanks for listening, and until next time at the same time, I'm Brad Pistol, reminding you to stay safe so you can step into a secure future.

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