By the time a United States citizen starts collecting a Social Security check they know what their budget will be for the next few years. The truth is that once we apply for the retirement benefit there is no way to increase the monthly check except for the COLA. But the COLA is not directly dependent on the citizens; it is the United States Government that determines this increase.
In this case, before applying for a Social Security Administration retirement check, it is advisable to maximize all possible options. If we take into account that with only three steps we will get a check closer to the maximum $4,873, it is possible that it is worth trying. Anything we do to get a bigger monthly retirement check is a good idea.
So before we apply for the retirement benefit we should look at what the requirements are to consider. If we keep this in mind all the time while we are working, the golden years will be more comfortable and the check that the Social Security Administration will send us to our checking account will be something much more voluminous.
Extending the Social Security Administration payment to the fullest extent possible
The first thing to keep in mind when planning for retirement is that if we already have a check from the Social Security Administration, we can’t increase it. Thus, everything we do to maximize the check should be done before retirement. Knowing this makes it easier to plan for our golden years.
For that reason, we must take into account three aspects:
- Retirement age.
- The years worked.
- The salary collected during the years worked before retirement.
These are the three key pillars for increasing monthly payments from the Social Security Administration. However, not all citizens can maximize these three elements. Still, we could get a bigger check just by maximizing any one of them. Every effort will always be rewarded in this case.
In order to qualify for the best possible check what we have to do is to apply for retirement at the age of 70 after having worked 35 years. To this, we must add a good salary collection during those years. If we are close to these characteristics, the payment that will arrive will be close to 4,873 dollars. Undoubtedly, this would be a very useful benefit for those Americans who only get a monthly payment from the Social Security Administration.
If we do not have a very high benefit, we always have the option of getting other extra checks from Social Security, such as the Supplemental Security Income. However, this payment has different requirements, so if we do not meet them we will not be able to access the benefit and we will have to recalculate our monthly budget.