Georgia Benefits Guide for Disabled Veterans

Tax Exemptions and Financial Assistance

Do 100% Disabled Veterans Pay Property Taxes in Georgia?

Georgia’s disabled veteran homestead exemption removed up to $121,812 of assessed value for tax year 2025. Statute sets the ceiling at the greater of $32,500 or the maximum specially adapted housing grant allowed under 38 U.S.C. § 2102, so it rises most years as that federal grant does. Check the current amount with the Georgia Department of Revenue.

Who is eligible for the disabled veteran homestead exemption?

A veteran rated 100% totally disabled qualifies for the homestead exemption, so does one rated below 100% but paid at the 100% rate for unemployability, and so does a veteran holding a VA statutory award for:

1. loss or permanent loss of use of a foot, or
2. loss or permanent loss of use of a hand, or
3. loss of sight in one or both eyes, or
4. permanent impairment of both eyes meeting the stated acuity standard

An unremarried surviving spouse or surviving minor children can keep the exemption after the veteran’s death, for as long as they actually occupy the home. Filing happens at county level rather than with the state, through the tax commissioner, tax receiver or tax assessor depending on the county.

Other Homestead Tax Exemptions

Georgia also has a separate homestead exemption for the unremarried surviving spouse of a service member killed in, or who died as a result of, any war or armed conflict. It removes $60,000 of assessed value plus an additional indexed sum, which together came to $121,812 for 2025, and it continues until the spouse remarries. The Georgia Department of Revenue administers it alongside the disabled veteran exemption.

Certain counties may have general homestead exemptions along with others keyed to age or income, with the terms varying from one county to the next. Ask your county tax commissioner’s office what applies at your address.

Georgia Income Tax Benefits for Veterans

Georgia shields military retirement income from state tax based on age rather than a disability rating. A veteran under 62 can exclude up to $17,500 of military retirement pay, and a second $17,500 applies for anyone with at least that much earned income alongside the pension.

From 62 the state’s general retirement income exclusion takes over and gets considerably more generous: up to $35,000 between 62 and 64, and up to $65,000 from 65 onward. Learn more.

A Bigger Military Retirement Exclusion Arrives in 2027

House Bill 266, signed in 2025, adds an alternative from tax year 2027. A veteran under 65 will be able to exclude up to $65,000 of military retirement income with no earned income condition attached. It cannot be combined with Georgia’s general retirement income exclusion, so a veteran elects one or the other, and the age-based exclusions remain available to those who prefer them.

State Income Tax Forgiveness for Combat Deaths

Where a service member dies while serving in a combat zone, or later dies of wounds, disease or injury incurred there, Georgia does not apply state income tax for the year of death, nor for any earlier year reaching back to the first day of that combat zone service. Tax already assessed for those years is abated rather than collected.

Need help getting the rating you deserve for more benefits and monthly compensation? Get a free case evaluation here.

Housing Assistance

Buying a Home with a VA Loan in Georgia

A service-connected disability makes the federal VA home loan cheaper. A borrower who receives VA compensation, or who is entitled to it but takes retirement or active-duty pay instead, pays no VA funding fee, which on a mid-sized loan saves several thousand dollars at closing. Surviving spouses receiving Dependency and Indemnity Compensation get the same waiver. The loan itself needs no down payment and carries no monthly mortgage insurance.

Veterans who need the house itself adapted should look at the VA’s Specially Adapted Housing and Special Home Adaptation grants, which pay toward ramps, widened doorways, roll-in showers and similar work. The same grant ceiling that sets those awards is what Georgia uses to index its homestead exemption each year.

Georgia’s Own Home Loan Program for Veterans

Georgia has a veteran mortgage program of its own through the Department of Community Affairs. Peach Select VA offers 30-year fixed VA mortgages at a low interest rate through participating lenders. It competes on rate rather than cash up front, so no down payment assistance comes with it, and household income has to fall inside the limits set for your area.

Programs for Homeless Veterans in Georgia

The VA’s homeless programs operate through the Georgia health care systems. HUD-VASH pairs a housing voucher with VA support services, SSVF handles prevention and rapid re-housing and is designed around the household rather than the veteran alone, HCHV provides outreach and contracted residential treatment, and the Grant and Per Diem program funds transitional housing.

Transportation Benefits

Free Driver License and ID Cards

Georgia issues a veteran’s driver license or ID card at no charge to residents who left service with an honorable or a medical discharge. National Guard members and former members qualify as well, either through active duty service or 20 years of service, though a training activation on its own does not count. Take a Member 4 copy of the DD Form 214 to a Department of Driver Services office along with proof of residency, a birth certificate or passport, your Social Security card and two documents showing your address. A separate honorary license provision covers spouses. More info here.

Do Veterans Get Free Car Registration in Georgia?

A qualifying veteran is exempt from the vehicle ad valorem tax on a single vehicle, and the exemption is for either the annual property tax or the one-time title tax, whichever is applicable. Georgia grants it to a veteran the VA has verified as 100% totally and permanently service-connected disabled, and also to one rated unemployable who holds a statutory VA award for the loss or permanent loss of use of feet or hands, loss of sight in one or both eyes, or qualifying permanent vision impairment.

Purple Heart and Medal of Honor plate holders are exempt as well. The exemption attaches to one vehicle only. It usually travels with a Disabled Veteran plate, though a veteran who prefers a different veteran plate can now choose one and keep the exemption. Apply through your local county tag office. More info.

Parking and Refueling for Disabled Veterans

Properly displayed, the Disabled Veteran plate lets the driver use spaces reserved for people with disabilities without needing a separate placard. And where a filling station offers both full and self service, a veteran driving on that plate can ask for full service at the self-service price, provided nobody in the vehicle is capable of pumping the fuel, which Georgia defines as aged 16 or over and not disabled. Find out more.

Education Benefits

The Georgia HERO Scholarship

Georgia’s own scholarship for military families is the HERO Scholarship, offered for combat-zone service. It pays $2,000 per award year at a University System or Technical College System institution or a private non-profit college in Georgia that qualifies for HOPE. For-profit schools are excluded, and the money can go toward graduate coursework as well as an undergraduate degree.

Members of the Georgia National Guard and the U.S. military reserves who served a qualifying term in a combat zone can claim it themselves, and so can their children. A qualifying term means 181 cumulative days in a combat zone on or after February 1, 2003, and a child qualifies for that service alone. The child must have been born before the qualifying term or within nine months of its start, and must have been 25 or younger during that term.

The serving member receives four award years, $8,000 in total. A child receives one award year for each qualifying term the parent completed, up to four terms, and a child whose parent was evacuated from the combat zone with severe injuries before completing 181 days counts as having one qualifying term. A spouse qualifies when the member was killed in the combat zone, or later died or became 100% disabled from injuries received there, and in those cases the family receives the full four award years regardless of how long the deployment lasted. Apply within 24 months, and eligibility ends eight years after it begins.

Employment Benefits

Veterans Hiring Preference

Georgia adds points to a passing score on a numerically scored written entrance examination for State employment. Five points go to an honorably discharged veteran who served on active duty during a time of armed conflict. Guard and reserve members earn the same five points for active duty of any length during Operation Iraqi Freedom or Operation Enduring Freedom, or during Desert Shield or Desert Storm in a listed area of imminent danger.

Ten points go instead to a veteran with a VA-certified service-connected disability of 10% or more, or to a veteran over 55 entitled to a disability pension or compensation. Ten points also go to the spouse of a disabled veteran whom that disability disqualifies for appointment, and to the unmarried widow or widower of a deceased veteran of any period of armed conflict. The point preference replaces other similar federal or state preferences rather than stacking on top of them.

When a hiring agency uses no numerically scored written exam, it must give preference to an eligible veteran whose qualifications match the most suitable non-veteran applicant. In a reduction in personnel, a veteran of any period of armed conflict rated a successful performer cannot be discharged or reduced in rank or salary ahead of a non-veteran.

The preference does not apply to promotion, demotion or transfer, and a general discharge does not disqualify a veteran from it. See State Personnel Board Rule 478-1-.18.

Career Advisement and Training

The Veterans Education Career Transition Resource Center (VECTR) at 1001 South Armed Forces Boulevard in Warner Robins offers career advise, job training, resume and interview help, accelerated certificate programs and a testing center for credentials and licenses.

Business Certificate of Exemption

A veteran with an honorable discharge and a service-connected disability rating of 10% or more can receive a certificate granting exemption from the occupation tax and the administrative and regulatory fees a business would normally owe. The certificate is valid for ten years and is applied for through the county Probate Court. Check eligibility with GDVS.

Recreation Benefits

Do Veterans Get a Discount at Georgia State Parks?

Georgia gives a 25% reduction on entrance fees at state parks, historic sites and recreational areas. It goes to veterans discharged under honorable conditions who hold a VA service-connected disability rating. Take a DD Form 214, verification of the disability and proof of Georgia residency to a GDVS Veterans Field Service Office; the paperwork goes to the GDVS central office for approval and the discount card arrives by post. Details on the discount.

Can Georgia Veterans Get a Discount on Fishing and Hunting Licenses?

• A free One-Time Veterans Hunting and Fishing License is available for Georgia resident veterans who served 90 days or more on active federal duty and were honorably discharged on or after July 1, 2005. It’s valid for one year from issue and can only ever be issued once.
• A veteran carrying a permanent and total disability rating qualifies for a three-year disability sportsman’s license at $15 plus a $3 transaction fee, covering hunting, big game, the Georgia migratory bird stamp, salt and freshwater fishing and mountain trout. An annual version costs $5 plus the same transaction fee.
• An Adult Lifetime Sportsman’s License comes at a 20% discount for honorably discharged resident veterans.

See all licenses and apply here →

Healthcare Benefits

National Guard members injured, disabled or killed on State Active Duty are covered by state healthcare and compensation provisions for those service-related conditions. For everything else, care is provided through three VA medical centers and the clinics and Vet Centers attached to them.

VA Medical Centers

• Joseph Maxwell Cleland Atlanta VA Medical Center: 1670 Clairmont Road, Decatur, GA 30033
• Charlie Norwood VA Medical Center: 950 15th Street, Augusta, GA 30904. This downtown campus is the one with emergency services. A second division sits at One Freedom Way, Augusta, GA 30904, handling primary and specialty care including dermatology, dental, audiology and blind rehabilitation, with no emergency department; a weekday shuttle travels between the two.
• Carl Vinson VA Medical Center: 1826 Veterans Boulevard, Dublin, GA 31021

Community-based outpatient clinics and Vet Centers reach well beyond those three addresses. Use the VA facility locator to find the closest to you.

Vet Centers in Georgia

Vet Centers offer counseling outside the VA medical system, at no cost and without enrollment in VA health care. They serve combat veterans, veterans and service members who experienced military sexual trauma in any era, and their families. Georgia Vet Centers include:

• Atlanta Vet Center: 1800 Phoenix Boulevard, Building 400, Suite 404, College Park, GA 30349
• Augusta Vet Center: 2050 Walton Way, Suite 100, Augusta, GA 30904
• Columbus Vet Center: 2601 Cross Country Drive, Condominium B-2, Suite 900, Columbus, GA 31906
• Lawrenceville Vet Center: 930 River Centre Place, Lawrenceville, GA 30043
• Macon Vet Center: 750 Riverside Drive, Macon, GA 31201
• Marietta Vet Center: 980 South Cobb Drive, Marietta, GA 30060
• Savannah Vet Center: operating from a temporary office at the Savannah VA community based outpatient clinic, 1170 Shawnee Street, Savannah, GA 31419, alongside its Mobile Vet Center

Mobile Vet Centers are based at the Lawrenceville, Macon and Savannah offices, and satellite locations serve Fort Moore and Fort Stewart.

Georgia War Veterans Homes

Georgia operates two skilled nursing homes for war veterans. Admission requires wartime service, a discharge under other than dishonorable conditions, and VA approval that the veteran needs skilled nursing care. The residency requirement is 2 years in Georgia immediately before applying, or 5 years of the last 15.

• Georgia War Veterans Nursing Home at Augusta: 1101 15th Street, Augusta, GA 30901 | Admissions: (706) 721-2405
• Georgia War Veterans Home at Milledgeville: 2249 Vinson Highway, Milledgeville, GA 31061 | Phone: 478-445-3234

Residents pay a nominal daily fee, and VA covers the fee for a veteran rated 70% or higher, or admitted because of a service-connected condition. Others can apply for federal Aid and Attendance to help with it.

Certain health conditions prevent admission: contagious disease, behavioral and psychiatric problems, dependence on line-operated mechanical support, and ongoing chemotherapy. Ask the admissions office at the home you are applying to about anything specific to your circumstances.

Burial and Survivor Benefits

The Georgia Department of Veterans Service operates two veterans memorial cemeteries and the VA National Cemetery Administration operates two national cemeteries in the state. Additionally, Andersonville National Cemetery is administered by the National Park Service and it is the only Park Service national cemetery still open to new burials.

Georgia State Veterans Memorial Cemeteries

• Georgia Veterans Memorial Cemetery at Milledgeville: 2617 Vinson Highway, Milledgeville, GA 31061 | Phone: (478) 445-3363
• Georgia Veterans Memorial Cemetery at Glennville: 8819 U.S. Highway 301, Glennville, GA 30427 | Phone: (912) 654-5398

An eligible veteran is buried at no cost: the gravesite, the vault, the marker, a columbarium niche and use of the committal chapel are all covered, and the same applies to an eligible spouse or dependent. What the family pays for is the funeral home side, the casket, preparing the body, transportation and clergy.

Eligibility follows the VA’s rules, with a separation under other than dishonorable conditions as the baseline. Reserve and National Guard members qualify when they were entitled to retirement pay at death, or completed a full term of service and died after August 1, 1990, and so do members who die in the line of duty on active duty. A spouse may be interred in the same plot, and a dependent qualifies where they are unmarried and under 21, or have a life-long dependency on the veteran. Find out more.

National Cemeteries

• Georgia National Cemetery, open to casketed and cremated remains: 1080 Scott Hudgens Drive, Canton, GA 30114 | Phone: 770-479-9300
• Marietta National Cemetery, closed to new gravesites though burials in existing ones continue: 500 Washington Avenue, Marietta, GA 30060 | Phone: 866-236-8159

The VA provides the gravesite, opens and closes the grave, supplies a burial liner and a headstone or marker, maintains the site in perpetuity, and adds a burial flag and a Presidential Memorial Certificate.

Survivor Benefits

The Georgia Department of Veterans Service helps families arrange burial honors, order headstones and flags and presidential memorial certificates, and file for survivor benefits. Those include Dependency and Indemnity Compensation, a Survivors’ Pension, CHAMPVA health coverage, accrued benefits, and Chapter 35 education assistance. Read more about getting survivor benefits.

On the state side, the disabled veteran homestead exemption passes to an unremarried surviving spouse, and to surviving minor children, for as long as they live in the home.

Federal Benefits Available to Georgia Veterans

Besides Georgia’s specific benefits, disabled veterans also get a wide range of federal VA disability benefits, including:

• Monthly tax-free compensation payments based on disability rating (calculate it here)
• Medical care, including mental health services and counseling
• Home loans and housing benefits
• Vocational rehabilitation and employment services
• Education benefits through the GI Bill
• Survivor benefits
• Federal hiring preference

Eligibility for some of these benefits depends on the disability rating percentage. Use the links below to see what federal benefits Georgia veterans can get with a rating of 50%, 60%, 70%, 80%, etc.

• 50% VA disability benefits
• 60% VA disability benefits
• 70% VA disability benefits
• 80% VA disability benefits
• 90% VA disability benefits

100% Disabled Veteran Benefits

Veterans with a 100% disability rating receive the highest level of federal VA benefits, including:

• Full monthly VA compensation
• Full VA healthcare coverage
• Dental care
• Adaptive equipment grants

See all federal benefits for a 100% disabled Georgia veteran →

100% Disabled Veteran Benefits for Spouse and Dependents

Spouses and family members of 100% disabled veterans may also be able to get several benefits:

• CHAMPVA healthcare
• DIC eligibility
• Education benefits, including Georgia’s HERO Scholarship where combat-zone service applies
• A continued property tax exemption, which in Georgia continues until the surviving spouse remarries
• Access to Georgia state resources

Benefits for Toxic Exposure

Georgia’s military installations have various contamination issues, from PFAS to industrial solvents in groundwater, fuel and petroleum, heavy metals and buried hazardous waste. Three of them are on the EPA’s Superfund National Priorities List: Robins Air Force Base, Marine Corps Logistics Base Albany and the Macon Naval Ordnance Plant.

Georgia Military Bases with Known Toxins

• Air Force Plant 6 (Marietta)
• Dobbins Air Reserve Base (Marietta)
• Fort Gordon (Augusta)
• Fort Stewart (Hinesville)
• Fort Benning (Columbus)
• Marine Corps Logistics Base Albany (Albany), on the Superfund National Priorities List since 1989, where landfill operations, industrial spills and leaking PCB transformers reached the groundwater
• Moody Air Force Base (Valdosta)
• Robins Air Force Base (Houston County, next to Warner Robins), where a landfill and sludge lagoon were added to the Superfund National Priorities List in 1987, with solvents, heavy metals and cyanide in the groundwater
• Macon Naval Ordnance Plant (Macon), a Navy ordnance and metal-plating works from 1941 to 1965, added to the Superfund National Priorities List in 2013 over trichloroethylene in groundwater and PCBs in Rocky Creek

If you served at a base in a different state, check its history of toxic contamination and potential health effects using the Military Base Toxic Exposure Map or get in touch with us for a free evaluation of your claim.

Getting VA Disability in Georgia

Getting through the VA disability claims process can be tricky, but there are local and national resources to help guide you. These include veteran groups, state-supported VA services, and experienced disability attorneys.

Free Guide to Claiming and Winning Benefits

Attorney Matthew Hill has written THE book on how to get VA disability compensation and benefits. And it’s yours free of charge.

Georgia State Legal Aid and Resources

The Georgia Department of Veterans Service (GDVS) provides statewide assistance with VA claims, accessing healthcare, education, housing programs, and survivor benefits. Find your nearest GDVS office here.

Georgia veterans facing certain non-violent legal charges may be eligible for Veterans Treatment Courts, which focus on rehabilitation and connecting veterans with treatment and VA benefits instead of traditional sentencing. These courts are available in select counties. Learn more.

Help from Experienced Lawyers

Our VA-accredited lawyers proudly represent veterans who were denied or underrated by the VA, with no upfront costs. Contact us for a free evaluation, and even if we don’t take your case, we’ll point you in the right direction. Hill & Ponton has successfully assisted disabled veterans all over Georgia and across the USA.

• Hinesville VA Disability Lawyers
• Warner Robins VA Lawyers