My wife claimed her benefit at age 62. She is now 67 and I'm 64, still working full time. I plan to claim my benefit at my FRA of 66 and 2 months. My question is, can I claim a spousal benefit now from my wife's SSA record, and then switch to my own record at FRA?

Hi,

No, since you were born after January 1 1954 you would be deemed to be filing for your own Social Security retirement benefits when and if you apply for spousal benefits. You would then be paid only essentially the higher of those two benefit rates, and your benefit amount would be reduced for age if you start drawing prior to your full retirement age (FRA). Even if you had been born before January 2 1954, though, you couldn't file for spousal benefits prior to FRA without also being deemed to have applied for your own retirement benefits at the same time.

You may want to strongly consider using our software to fully explore and compare your various options in order to identify your best strategy for claiming your benefits.

Best, Jerry