If you're 60 years old, then it's what you don't know about Social Security that could cost you tens of thousands of dollars of the course of your lifetime.

That's why in today's video I'm talking to you, and I'm going to share five secrets, five things that you need to know about Social Security that could help you dramatically improve the way you utilize this incredible tool in your own retirement strategy. I'm a financial advisor and I've worked with hundreds of clients over the course of my career.

And the number one secret I want clients to know or the number one things I want them to understand is this. You need to understand what you're using Social Security to optimize for. Now, some people look at Social Security and say it's an income source. And it's income is an income as an income. What do you mean? What are you optimizing for? It's just this one single thing. And yes, different amounts at different ages. But what do you mean by that? Well, what I mean by that is there's four distinct things you can optimize for with Social Security. Number one is longevity insurance. You can use it as a hedge to protect against what if you live for a very long time. If you live until your 90s or even beyond,

Social Security is an income source that you won't outlive. So if the goal is to minimize

risk in your plan, waiting to delay Social Security could be the best thing that you could do.

By waiting to delay, you have that income floor that will last for the rest of your lifetime.

That's not the goal for everyone, though. For some people, they want to protect a spouse. Now, protecting a spouse could look very different. Maybe you look at finances and you're very good. You're very strong with your financial plan. You understand how all the pieces interact. But you have a spouse that's not as involved or doesn't care as much. Well, as you're thinking about Social Security, it's not just what's best for you in your lifetime, it's what if you pre-decease your spouse? How do you utilize Survivor's benefits, spousal benefits, to ensure that your spouse is well taken care of even if you pre-decease them? The third thing you might be optimizing for is legacy. Social Security is wonderful, but that money stops once you,

and if you're married, your spouse, pass away. That's not money that's going to continue going

to your children or grandchildren, and some of you listening, one of your primary goals with your

financial plan, is to say, how do I ensure that I have money left over that I can pass on

to children or grandchildren? If that's you,

Social Security won't pass to them, but what sometimes people will do is they will collect

early so they can invest that Social Security benefit. They can set that benefit aside so that

when they do pass, the income discontinues, but the investment pool, the savings they've built up,

that can pass along to their children or

grandchildren in a tax-free way. And then finally, the fourth thing that people might want to

optimize for is investment returns. People very rarely take this into account, but when you look at

a social security break-even analysis, it's typically looking at how long will you live,

at what age should you collect benefits so that your lifetime cumulative

benefit is maximized? That's a good starting point, but it's an incomplete picture if you're

looking at everything. Let's illustrate this with a basic example. You're 62 and you're going to retire.

Now, you can take Social Security today, or you can delay it, and you can maximize your benefit

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