Hi LEH54,
Congratulations on your upcoming retirement and great to plan !
Keep in mind that the more other income you have, the more of your social security benefits will be taxable; up to 85% of your social security benefits could be taxable income. If you are working in 2024, and have wages and other income, then more of your social security benefits would be taxable income, whereas if you waited until 2025 and had less other income in 2025, then less of your social security benefits would be taxable.
Less taxable portion of social security benefits, results in less tax.
Here is a great article to help you determine how much of your social security benefits would be taxable in 2024 , the year you are working; https://ttlc.intuit.com/turbotax-support/en-us/help-article/retirement-benefits/social-security-income-taxable/L21rHTtDp_US_en_US.
I hope you find this information helpful!
Connie
Whether you apply for social security benefits before the end of December or in the first week of January should not matter to your benefits. It may only delay your first payment by a month. As long as you are applying after age 70, you will be getting the maximum benefits that you can. In either case, you will not have any reporting for 2024 as you will not get any benefits paid to you until 2025. Here is a link that helps explain timing and your maximum delayed retirement benefits due to waiting until you turn 70.
https://www.ssa.gov/OACT/quickcalc/early_late.html
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