I'm 64 and wife is 63 and we are both retired. We both are SS eligible from work histories. I'm the larger wage earner and at my FRA the spousal benefit will be her highest draw. Can she file for her benefits now (age 63) without impacting her spousal benefits when I reach FRA and file for my benefits? Yours, Pat

Hi Pat,

If your wife files for her retirement benefit early and you wait till 66 to file for your retirement benefit she will be able to wait till 66 to file for her excess spousal benefit. This excess spousal benefit is the difference between half of your full retirement benefit and 100 percent of her full retirement benefit. Depending on the level and difference in your relative earnings, the excess spousal benefit may be zero or very small. (Btw, people that were 61 or younger on January 1, 2016 are forced to take their excess spousal benefit as soon as they possibly can, i.e., as soon as filing for a retirement benefit by their partner makes them eligible to collect a spousal benefit. In your wife's case, she was 62 or over on that date, so she can wait until she reaches 66 to file for her excess spousal benefit rather than be forced to take a reduced excess spousal benefit when you turn 66 and she is 65.)

I doubt your plan is optimal with respect to maximizing your lifetime benefits. The optimal strategy could involve your wife filing for her retirement benefit when you reach full retirement, you filing just for your full spousal benefit (equal to half of her full retirement benefit) on her work record (which you can do because you were 62 or older on January 1, 2016) and then your waiting till 70 to take your own retirement benefit at which point your wife, then 69, would file for her excess spousal benefit. Another option is for you to file say, around 68, for your retirement benefit and have your wife file just for a spousal benefit and then have her take her retirement benefit at 70. Yet a third option would be for you both simply to wait till 70 to take your highest possible retirement benefits.

For just $40, our Maximize My Social Security software can run though all the alternative options for you in a minute or so and figure out which will produce the highest lifetime benefits. What you learn could mean tens of thousands of extra dollars compared to your own proposed claiming strategy. Your proposed strategy could easily end up with your wife collecting reduced retirement benefits for the rest of her life until you died and your collecting your full retirement benefit rather than your 32 percent higher age-70 benefit.

All best, Larry