Will my Social Security survivor benefits affect my disabled 18-year-old son's SSI eligibility?

Yes, your son should be considered his own household for SSI deeming purposes once he turns 18, even if he continues living with you. At that point, your survivor benefits shouldn't directly affect his SSI eligibility or payment amount. However, if you're providing food and shelter for him, SSA might apply something called the 'one-third reduction rule' which could reduce his SSI payment. Also, make sure he's applying for Adult Disabled Child (DAC) benefits on your deceased husband's record too, not just SSI, as those might provide higher benefits.

my sons on ssi and turned 18 last yr. hes considered his own household now but they reduced his check becuz i pay for evrything. they call it the value of one third rule or somethin. so he gets less than the full ssi amount

So sorry about your husband. I went through something similar with my daughter. It's so confusing when you're dealing with multiple benefit types while grieving.

The situation you're describing involves two important concepts: household composition for SSI and disability benefits for Adult Disabled Children. Let me break it down: 1. For SSI purposes, your son will indeed be considered his own household once he turns 18, meaning your income won't be "deemed" to him. This is good news. 2. However, as others mentioned, if you're providing food and shelter without charging him fair market value, the "Value of One-Third Reduction" (VTR) rule applies, reducing his maximum SSI by about 1/3. 3. More importantly, it sounds like your son might qualify for what's called Childhood Disability Benefits (CDB, formerly called Disabled Adult Child or DAC benefits) on your deceased husband's record. These benefits are often higher than SSI. 4. If he qualifies for CDB, he might not need SSI at all, or might receive a small supplemental amount. The most important thing is to make sure he applies for both programs. Many SSA representatives don't explain all the options clearly.

I had this EXACT situation with my daughter. Your survivors benefits WON'T affect his SSI once he's 18, BUT if you don't charge him rent, they'll reduce his SSI by 1/3!!! What I did was create a formal rental agreement charging him $300/month (you can find templates online). Make sure it's close to "fair market value" for a room in your area. He can pay from his SSI. This avoided the reduction and actually gave us both more total money to work with. The SSA paperwork is RIDICULOUS but worth doing correctly!!!

Dont forget that he might stil qualify for medicade even if he gets denied ssi. My nephew got denied but stil got the medical insurence. Some states hav different rules for medicade only claims.

You are getting a lot of advice here but I spent hours trying to reach SSA to get the official answers to these exact questions. The phone lines are always busy and I got disconnected twice after waiting over an hour. I finally used a service called Claimyr (claimyr.com) that got me connected to a live SS agent in about 20 minutes instead of waiting on hold for hours. They have a video showing how it works: https://youtu.be/Z-BRbJw3puU Once I finally talked to someone, they explained that my son needed to apply for both SSI AND disabled adult child benefits, and that different income rules apply to each program. Definitely worth speaking directly with SSA to get the correct information for your specific situation.

Wait I'm confused now. Is SSI the same as SSDI? My cousin gets SSDI and nobody looks at his living situation at all.

theres also a rule about how much money he can hav in the bank with ssi. only $2000 i think. but the other benefits from his dads record dont hav that rule

Thank you all so much for this helpful information! I feel much better prepared for his upcoming birthday now. I'm going to: 1) Make sure both the SSI and the Childhood Disability Benefits applications are being processed, 2) Create a rental agreement to avoid the one-third reduction rule, 3) Look into ABLE accounts for his savings, and 4) Use Claimyr to actually get through to SSA and confirm all of this information. This has been incredibly helpful!