Is it worth the wait?
Imma guess 62.
Work for the federal government and retire at 55 like my Dad.
I retired at 65. 9 months later, I decided to go back to work and start tomorrow. Retirement is boring.
Millennial here. What is this “retirement” thing?
I retired at 56, my Wife at 54. That was in 1991.
I received a Special Early Retirement from Ford Motor Company and signed up for Social Security at age 62.
We are doing great and we are greatful for our good health and financial security.
“Retired” at 67. Working part-time since 68. I’m 72. I’m hoping to work for at least one more year. When my contract ends, I might go nuts.
Its not the age you retire at, its the reason.
Was it health related
did you lose a good job
etc
I know people who retired when the pandemic shut everything down, it wasn’t their choice.
I have done mortgages for several older folks.
It seems several likely retired too soon. Some live on very little.
But everyone is different , it just depends on if you can have a solid income stream and little debt
Many plan to work well into their 60s or even 70’s.
Indeed my kid can’t retire until she’s 72.
The cash box is locked
Hillary Clinton
Democrats kept dipping into it until it was all gone.
Then be found indigo blue face down on desk.
My husband retired at 50. He had 30 years in plus the plant was closing. We were blessed because he was able to get his full retirement. The plant is now gone.
He took care of his dad for six months after his mom died. That would not have been possible if he had been working.
I knew that answer right away. It’s the earliest age to retire with reduced SS income (25% reduction). It takes 12 years of retirement to even that out where the government starts realizing that gain.
The next age is 55, IIRC and a LOT of that is disability (SSDI) claims. For those who can’t wait until 62.
There are many things affecting this stat. Some people lose their job around 58+ and give up. Some people have bad health by then and can’t work. People who work for themselves often “retire” early because our “retirement” is a very different thing. I “retired” at 60, but for the last 15 years I’ve spent plenty of time making my assets work. I kept managing 5 rentals for 10 years. I invest in stocks, bonds, mineral rights, I carry mortgages, Just the record keeping is a job. It’s OK because I like it, the rewards are very good once a foundation is set, which only took about 25 years.
I was going to wait til I turned 67, but since I got a blood clot in my knee I moved it to 65, 1 year from now.
Husband and I retired at 59 and 61 from IBM Research on their last good Early Retirement plan. Health benefits for life. Husband went to small startups during the boom days and did well and I used the retraining money to write movie scripts that were agented in Hollywood. Mostly just worked the same crazy hours but on all of my passions instead of workie stuffs. Husband finally retired and now spends his time writing software to support all of my projects. LOVE retirement.
Several years later I was given a year's private notice (from high up) that my job would be sent offshore. When I got laid off, I learned that I still had an old MCI pension that Bernie Ebbers had not been able to raid. With a fantastic severance package, I decided to retire and live off of our bank accounts for a couple of years before I applied for Social Security with a more reasonable 8% penalty for applying early. At that time, my home and autos were paid for and all of our credit cards were paid in full, thanks to my wife's excellent household financial planning ability.
That was almost ten years ago and I retired just below the national average.
I looked at the difference in SS from 62 to 67. It would take me 15 years to make up that difference so retirement at 62 was a no brainer.