Thinking of Waiting to Claim Your Social Security Benefits? Answer This Question First
As you get older, you have a lot of choices to make that will shape your retirement. One of the most important is when to start getting your Social Security checks. These benefits can be a key source of income and, while you can start getting money as soon as 62, you'll get a lot more if you wait longer.
Delaying the start of your benefits until full retirement age -- between 66 and 67 -- will enable you to avoid losing some of your benefits to early filing penalties. But if you really want to max out your income, you'd actually have to wait until age 70 to get delayed retirement credits.
There's a cost to this delay, though. You go years without checks coming in. And this can be especially painful during a recession, which the country has officially entered. So before you decide waiting is right for you, you need to ask yourself this key question.
Source Fool.com
