by Derek Farwell
Columnist

Being a veteran is something that only a very small percentage of the population can claim. The military is certainly not for everyone, and even those that do it sometimes encounter difficulties later in their lives. Fortunately, the government has recognized this and offers a number of different programs to America’s veterans through the Department of Veterans Affairs. These benefits are available to most veterans who meet some minimum standards of service and characterization of discharge, and different benefits have different requirements so I will not list them all, but say that they can be found out by either visiting the VA’s website which is www.va.gov, or by calling or visiting a county veteran service officer. While the VA does have many programs to give assistance and some medical care to veterans it is important to remember that the VA doesn’t want veterans to be completely dependent on the system. Most benefits are designed as a supplemental benefit. There are far too many to describe them all, so I will discuss just a few here.

One of the more common benefits sought by veterans is service connection for injuries or illnesses that are caused or aggravated by military service. It is done by through a fairly quick and easy application process followed by a game of hurry up and wait. Service connection can be granted for any medical condition from simple hearing loss to complex illnesses or injuries including amputations or certain types of cancers for veterans that meet qualifying criteria. Some conditions are specific to veterans who served in a specified area or period of time, and specifics on that can again be found at the VA’s website. The most important factor that dictates whether a medical condition will be service connected or not is medical evidence. Something that veterans don’t often like to hear is that in the vast majority of cases, the VA doesn’t really care what we say about our injuries and illnesses; they want to hear what a doctor has to say. For instance, I am not a doctor and I have no way of intelligently diagnosing myself with a specific condition, but my doctor can. If service connection is granted for one or more medical conditions then a decision is made on the severity of that condition and a corresponding percentage is assigned to each individual condition and the different percentages are combined using a special form of VA math to come up with an overall disability percentage. The overall percentage is a reflection of how significantly your service connected disabilities impact your ability to get and keep gainful employment. It is not meant as a system to hand out money simply for being a veteran, it is meant to assist veterans whose ability to work has been affected.

There are also a couple of homeowner related benefits. The first is that most states have some sort of property tax exclusion for veterans whose overall service connected disabilities are at an appropriate rate. Each state makes its own rules and being a resident of Minnesota I only know the Minnesota guidelines which have two different tiers. If you are service connected at 70% or higher you don’t have to pay property tax on the first $150,000 of the overall value of your home. If you are rated at 100% permanently and totally disabled then the first $300,000 is excluded from the value of your home. This benefit is utilized by providing proof to your county assessor that you meet those criteria. The other main homeowner benefit is the VA Home Loan Guaranty. A common misconception is that the VA actually gives you a home loan, but this is not the case. The VA only guarantees the loan up to a certain amount thus making it easier to attain a home loan from a lender. The loan guarantee can be used to help purchase a new or used home, condo, or refinance your existing home, and as long as you remain in good standing, you may reuse the loan guarantee as many times as you want. There are of course more rules and regulations associated with the home loan guaranty program than I can list here, so for more information you can again check the VA’s website or simply ask someone who has used it before.

There are a lot of benefits that are available to people who have served, many of which are not very well known to veterans, so I will try to bring up and explain some of the benefits in future articles.

drfarwell@hotmail.com