It’s easy to make mistakes when you are planning to retire. Some of the biggest mistakes apply to all employees; a few apply only to CSRS or FERS retirees. All can be costly. Here they are and what you can do to avoid them: Retiring on the spur of the moment. It can be disastrous, for two reasons. First, if you hand in your retirement application at the last minute, it may contain errors that delay processing or even cause it to be rejected. Second, decisions made in haste often come back to bite you. Once committed to a course…
Browsing: windfall elimination provision
Q. I’m retiring June 1. I’m 62 and will be 63 in September. I’m in CSRS Offset with 36 years and five months. Accrued sick leave will give me 37 years and six months. I’d like to hold off on taking Social Security. I might work when the dust settles in retirement. I have 35 years of covered Social Security earnings, so no windfall elimination provision reduction, just the CSRS Offset. Would it be wiser to take an annual 4 percent draw from the Thrift Savings Plan, wait until I’m 66 and then take Social Security? I have $205,000 in…
Q. I have 33 years in and am under CSRS. I will be 60 years old in May. I served less than two years in the Army in my 20s. I am a WG-8 making almost $25 an hour. I receive correspondence statements from Social Security that if I retire at age 62, I would be eligible for approximately $300 based on a second job 12 years ago and jobs before joining the government in the 1980s. 1. Should I buy back the time I have in the Army? 2. Will the buyback help increase my Social Security? Or will…
Q. Can I take the 40 percent loss I take on my Social Security, because of windfall elimination, as a retirement investment loss on my federal income tax? A. No.
Q. I am a Civil Service Retirement System employee, hired in 1979 and contemplating retiring April 3, 2013. 1. I will be subject to the windfall elimination provision because I earned 40 credits of Social Security eligibility prior to my federal employment. But my spouse is also eligible for Social Security and started receiving Social Security benefits of more than $1,900 a month (gross) starting last month (January 2012), whereas the Social Security Administration has estimated that my Social Security benefits would be approximately $385 a month (gross). Would I be eligible for spousal Social Security benefits? 2. A financial planner…