I am a 59 yr old mother and grandmother. I worked all my life raising 3 kids alone. I met someone at the same time my work went out of business. He worked on a dredge boat and we happily traveled around Alabama mostly (some Florida) with his job. We lived like we were married from 2004 till he died in 2019. I couldn't work because we moved every month or week with his job. I was totally dependent on him. He claimed me on his taxes and his perdium went in a separate account which I used to take care of home(camper we traveled in) He died from lung cancer without much notice. He was so busy working 15 he's a day, 7 days a week he didn't have time to go to the doctor and worked up till the end when he was hospitalized. I was thrower back out into the world with nothing but a truck which will probably be repossessed soon. I'm old and nobody wants to hire me. I'm gonna be homeless soon. Can I get get dependent benefits from him.? Nobody is getting any kind of survivor benefits or anything from him. His ex wife died years ago and his kids are grown. I was the only one dependent on him and I don't know what I'm gonna do. We lived in Alabama but he filed taxes in Louisiana where we are from. Please can you help me?

Hi. I'm sorry for your loss. You couldn't qualify for Social Security survivor benefits prior to age 60 unless you are disabled or you have a child who qualifies for survivor benefits on the deceased worker's account. Even when you reach age 60, though, the only way that you'd qualify for survivor benefits is if you were considered to be legally married to the deceased. Some states recognize common-law marriages, and Alabama did so prior to 2017.

According to Social Security's operations manual, these were the requirements for a relationship to be recognized as a legal common-law marriage by the state of Alabama prior to 2017:

"1. The capacity to marry;

2. Present agreement or mutual consent to enter into the marriage relationship;

3. Public recognition of the existence of the marriage; and

4. Public assumption of marital duties and cohabitation. See Gray v. Bush, 835 So. 2d 192, 194 (Ala. Civ. App. 2001).

Where a marriage (ceremonial or common-law) is contracted while an impediment exists, cohabitation as a married couple of the parties in good faith after removal of the impediment establishes a valid common-law marriage as of the day the impediment is removed. This is true even if the parties at the time the marriage was contracted were aware of the impediment, but they nevertheless manifest or demonstrate their desire to live as a married couple (i.e., conduct themselves and their affairs as would a married couple). Continued cohabitation as a married couple after the removal of the impediment raises a presumption that a valid common-law marriage arises immediately upon removal of the impediment." (https://secure.ssa.gov/apps10/poms.nsf/lnx/0200305075).

If the deceased listed you as his wife on his tax return, you might be able to submit that to Social Security as proof that he considered your relationship to be a common-law marriage. In any case, though, the only way that you can claim survivor benefits is by filing an application with Social Security. If they disallow your claim and if you disagree with their decision, you would then have appeal rights.

Best, Jerry