A wartime veteran in Michigan who needs daily help can receive a pension of up to $34,488 a year, about $2,874 a month, through VA Aid and Attendance (A&A). A surviving spouse can receive up to $18,697 a year, about $1,558 a month. It's one of the most underused VA pension benefits, and many Michigan families who qualify never apply because they don't know it exists.

For families facing assisted living or memory care costs that run several thousand dollars a month, A&A can be the difference between "we can't afford this" and "we can make this work." This guide covers who qualifies, how much you can receive, how to apply, and where to get free, accredited help in Michigan.

In This Guide

What Is Aid and Attendance?

Aid and Attendance (A&A) is an enhanced VA pension benefit for wartime veterans and their surviving spouses who need regular help with everyday activities. It isn't a separate program. It's the same VA pension paid at a higher maximum rate when you need care, so the Aid and Attendance figure is the maximum for the whole pension, not a second amount stacked on the basic rate. Aid and Attendance is not confined to the pension: VA describes Form 21-2680 as the way to apply for benefits "that will be added to your monthly compensation or pension benefits," so a veteran drawing VA disability compensation can pursue Aid and Attendance on the compensation side. This guide covers the pension route, where VA's condition is "You may be eligible for this benefit if you get a VA pension."

You may qualify if you need help with daily activities such as bathing, dressing, eating, using the toilet, or adjusting prosthetic devices. You can also qualify if you're bedridden, live in a nursing home due to mental or physical incapacity, or have severely limited eyesight (5/200 or less in both eyes).

A&A is tax-free, and the money can go toward any purpose, including in-home care, assisted living, or nursing home costs. That flexibility is what makes it so useful for Michigan families piecing together long-term care.

Think you or your spouse might qualify for A&A? Chat with Brevy's care navigator at brevy.com.

How Much Does VA Aid and Attendance Pay in Michigan?

The VA calculates your payment as the difference between your countable income and the Maximum Annual Pension Rate (MAPR) for your category. If your income is low enough, you receive the full amount. These rates are federal, so they're identical in Michigan and everywhere else.

Category Annual Rate Monthly Equivalent
Veteran, no dependents $29,093 About $2,424
Veteran with spouse $34,488 About $2,874
Two veterans married to each other (both A&A) $46,143 About $3,845
Surviving spouse, no dependents $18,697 About $1,558
Each additional dependent +$2,984 About +$249

The VA publishes these as annual amounts only. A monthly payment is the yearly award divided by 12.

These are the maximums. Your actual payment equals the maximum minus your countable income, but out-of-pocket medical and care expenses reduce that income, so most Michigan families paying for senior care end up near the maximum.

Who Qualifies?

Four tests must be met: service, age or disability status, medical need, and finances.

1. Wartime service. The veteran must have served at least 90 days of active duty with at least one day during a recognized wartime period (World War II, the Korean War, the Vietnam War, or the Gulf War, which continues through today). Combat service isn't required; active duty overlapping the period is enough. Someone who started active duty as an enlisted person after September 7, 1980 generally needs at least 24 months of active duty, or the full period they were called or ordered up (with some exceptions). An officer who started active duty after October 16, 1981 must not have previously served on active duty for at least 24 months.

2. No dishonorable discharge, plus one of four status tests. The veteran must not have received a dishonorable discharge, and at least one of these must be true: 65 or older; a permanent and total disability; a patient in a nursing home for long-term care because of a disability; or getting Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI) or Supplemental Security Income (SSI). Any one of the four is enough on its own. A wartime veteran under 65 who receives SSI, for example, meets this test with no adjudicated permanent-and-total rating at all.

3. Medical need. The veteran or surviving spouse must need regular help with daily activities, be bedridden, be in a nursing home due to disability, or have severely limited eyesight. VA Form 21-2680 (Examination for Housebound Status or Permanent Need for Regular Aid and Attendance) documents this; a medical examiner must fill out the examination information section.

4. Net worth under $163,699. VA's net worth calculation includes your and your dependents' assets (savings, investments, and property other than your home) plus your annual income for VA purposes, so comparing assets alone against the limit gives the wrong answer. Your primary residence is excluded, and VA recognizes one primary residence per claimant. Also excluded are personal effects suitable to and consistent with a reasonable mode of life, which the regulation illustrates as appliances and family transportation vehicles. The VA reviews assets transferred for less than fair market value in the 3 years before you file (a 36-month look-back under 38 CFR 3.276); a covered transfer can trigger a penalty period of up to five years.

The home the VA leaves out of that calculation may be worth checking on separately. Michigan exempts a qualifying disabled veteran's homestead from property tax, a state benefit claimed with the local assessor rather than the VA, and our guide to the Michigan disabled veteran property tax exemption covers the three ways to qualify.

How the Unreimbursed Medical Expense Math Works

Unreimbursed medical expenses (UME) are what make A&A reachable for many families. Because the pension is keyed to the income the VA counts, a claimant can lower that income by deducting UME, but only the portion above 5% of the maximum annual pension rate that applies to the household. That floor is $872 in 2026 for a veteran with no spouse or child, and higher for a veteran with dependents. Everything above that floor comes off your countable income, and if that brings countable income to $0 or below, you receive the full MAPR amount.

Consider a widow in a Michigan assisted living facility with $1,400 a month in Social Security and $800 a month in pension income, for $2,200 a month total, who pays $5,000 a month for care. Her $60,000 a year in unreimbursed care costs dwarfs the 5% floor, and what's left after it still wipes out her $26,400 a year in income, leaving countable income of $0. She would then receive the full 2026 surviving spouse A&A maximum of $18,697 a year, about $1,558 a month, on top of her existing income, for a total of roughly $3,758 a month toward the $5,000 care bill.

This is why documenting every medical and care cost matters so much: without unreimbursed medical expense evidence, income often looks "too high" on paper.

How to Apply for VA Aid and Attendance in Michigan

The steps below are the pension route, where VA's condition is "You may be eligible for this benefit if you get a VA pension." A veteran who draws VA disability compensation instead files the same medical exam form, because Form 21-2680 also covers Aid and Attendance "that will be added to your monthly compensation" benefits, but the wartime pension application in step 4 is not their form.

1
Step 1

File an Intent to File first if you're still gathering information

Submit VA Form 21-0966 (Intent to File) before the rest. VA says submitting an intent to file "can secure the earliest possible effective date for any retroactive payments you may be eligible to receive." You then have one year to complete and file the claim.

2
Step 2

Gather your documents

You'll need your DD-214 (discharge papers showing wartime service dates), a marriage certificate (if applying as a spouse or married veteran), a death certificate (if applying as a surviving spouse), income and asset statements, and documentation of medical and care expenses.

3
Step 3

Get the medical exam

Your physician completes VA Form 21-2680, documenting which daily activities you need help with and why. The more detail about specific limitations, the stronger the claim.

4
Step 4

File the pension application

A wartime veteran pursuing the pension route who isn't already receiving a VA pension submits VA Form 21P-527EZ (Application for Veterans Pension); a surviving spouse submits VA Form 21P-534EZ (Application for DIC, Survivors Pension, and/or Accrued Benefits). You can file online at VA.gov, by mail to the VA Pension Intake Center, in person at a VA regional office, or with help from an accredited attorney, accredited claims agent, or accredited Veterans Service Organization representative.

5
Step 5

Wait for the decision

Asked how long a decision takes, VA answers "It depends." It processes claims in the order it receives them, unless a claim requires priority processing.

An incomplete application is the most common reason for delay, so submit all supporting documents at once and have your physician be thorough on Form 21-2680.

Free Help in Michigan: The MVAA and County VSOs

You should never pay to file an initial VA claim, and in Michigan you don't have to. The Michigan Veterans Affairs Agency (MVAA) works to connect veterans and their families with the resources and benefits they've earned through service. For help determining pension eligibility and completing the application, MVAA tells veterans to contact their local Veteran Service Officer or call MVAA at 1-800-MICH-VET (1-800-642-4838), where technicians answer Monday through Friday, 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. That call connects you with an accredited Veteran Service Officer who can help you prepare the necessary forms, document the claim, and manage it through submission. The VA says the services an accredited VSO representative provides on your VA benefit claims are always free, while an accredited attorney or claims agent can charge fees.

MVAA also points veterans to a "Find an accredited VSO Near Me" locator, and veterans and dependents can choose any Veteran Service Officer or VA Benefits Counselor on the list for their county of residence, regardless of affiliation. A VSO can prepare your forms, gather the evidence the VA needs, and follow the claim through to a decision.

A word of caution: be wary of anyone charging fees to help with an initial VA pension claim. That help is free from an accredited VSO, and MVAA's locator will point you to one for your county. You can verify accreditation at va.gov/ogc/accreditation.asp.

How A&A Works with Michigan Medicaid and Medicare

Aid and Attendance can run alongside other programs, but they count money differently, so the timing and sequence of applying can matter.

A&A and Michigan Medicaid. VA Aid and Attendance and Michigan Medicaid (administered by the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services, MDHHS) are separate programs run under different rules, and a veteran or surviving spouse can often receive both at once. Michigan Medicaid looks at VA pension income in two steps. At the eligibility decision for an aged, blind, or disabled applicant, a state applies SSI income methodologies, under which the A&A allowance is not income, so generally only the basic pension counts toward the income limit; states that use eligibility criteria more restrictive than SSI may count it, so confirm the treatment for your case with MDHHS. Once someone is eligible, income that was disregarded at eligibility must be counted in the patient-pay calculation, so the A&A amount does count toward the patient-pay amount. The federal rule behind that step, 42 CFR 435.725, says by its own terms that it "applies to the following individuals in medical institutions and intermediate care facilities," so a Michigan waiver recipient living at home also has a post-eligibility calculation, but ask MDHHS which rule sets it rather than assuming this one does. Counting the income is not the end of the math either. Before any of it reaches the facility, 42 CFR 435.725(c) requires the agency to deduct five amounts in a fixed order: (1) a personal needs allowance, (2) a maintenance needs allowance for a spouse still at home, (3) a maintenance needs allowance for other family at home, (4) incurred expenses for medical or remedial care that no third party pays, and (5) any SSI and state supplement payments that continue. All five are deductions MDHHS must make, not benefits you apply for, so do not budget as though medical expenses are the only thing that comes off. For a full month in long-term care, Michigan sets that personal needs allowance, which MDHHS calls the patient allowance, at $60. One federal cap is important: when a single veteran with no dependents is receiving Medicaid-covered nursing facility care, the VA pension is reduced to $90 a month, and in Michigan that $90 becomes the veteran's patient allowance in place of the $60 rather than an addition to it, so the two are never added together. Because the programs interact this way, consult a VA-accredited representative or an elder law attorney before applying.

A&A and Medicare. Both can flow at the same time. Medicare covers acute medical care, while A&A pays cash the veteran can use for any care expense, including the room-and-board and personal-care costs Medicare doesn't cover.

For the bigger picture of paying for long-term care in the state, see our guide to how to pay for senior care in Michigan.

Common Misconceptions

"My husband served in peacetime, so A&A doesn't apply." Wartime periods are specific calendar ranges: the Vietnam Era runs through 1975 and the Gulf War continues through today. Many veterans who call themselves "peacetime veterans" actually served during a wartime period.

"A&A is only for service-connected disabilities." No. The pension route requires no service-connected disability at all: a wartime veteran qualifies by being 65 or older, permanently and totally disabled, in a nursing home for long-term care because of a disability, or receiving SSDI or SSI. Nor is Aid and Attendance limited to that route, since Form 21-2680 also applies for the benefit added to monthly compensation.

"Her net worth is $200,000, so she doesn't qualify." The VA's net worth calculation includes income as well as assets, and unreimbursed medical expenses above the 5% floor reduce the income the VA counts, so high care costs can pull the total below the $163,699 limit.

"The VA will take Mom's assets after she dies." Unlike Medicaid estate recovery, the VA does not recover pension payments from the estate after death.

Frequently Asked Questions

How much does VA Aid and Attendance pay in Michigan in 2026?

For 2026, the annual maximums are $29,093 for a single veteran, $34,488 for a married veteran, $46,143 for two eligible veterans married to each other, and $18,697 for a surviving spouse. Divide by 12 for the monthly payment, which works out to about $2,424, $2,874, $3,845, and $1,558. These are federal rates, identical in Michigan. Your actual payment equals the maximum minus countable income, and unreimbursed medical expenses reduce that income, so most families with significant care costs receive near the maximum.

Do I need combat service to qualify for A&A?

No. A&A requires 90 days of active duty with at least one day during a recognized wartime period (World War II, Korea, Vietnam, or the Gulf War through today). Deployment overseas or a combat assignment is not required. Many veterans who think of themselves as "peacetime veterans" actually served during a wartime period.

What is the 2026 net worth limit for A&A?

The 2026 net worth limit is $163,699, and VA's calculation combines your and your dependents' assets with annual income for VA purposes. The primary residence is excluded, as are personal effects suitable to a reasonable mode of life, such as family transportation vehicles. A 3-year (36-month) look-back on asset transfers applies, and a covered transfer can trigger a penalty period of up to five years.

Where can I get free help applying for A&A in Michigan?

Call the Michigan Veterans Affairs Agency (MVAA) at 1-800-MICH-VET (1-800-642-4838) to be connected with an accredited Veteran Service Officer, or use MVAA's locator to choose any VSO or VA Benefits Counselor listed for your county of residence. The VA says an accredited VSO representative's help on a VA benefit claim is always free, so never pay a non-accredited "pension consultant" for an initial VA pension claim.

Can I get A&A and Michigan Medicaid at the same time?

Often yes, but they're separate programs that count money differently. At the Medicaid eligibility decision, a state applying SSI income methodologies does not count the A&A allowance, so generally only the basic pension counts toward the income limit; once you're eligible and in a nursing facility, the A&A amount does count and can raise your patient-pay amount. Before MDHHS sets that amount it must deduct five things in a fixed order, starting with a personal needs allowance and a maintenance needs allowance for a spouse still at home; incurred medical expenses are only the fourth of the five. A single veteran with no dependents in Medicaid-covered nursing facility care has the VA pension reduced to $90 a month, which in Michigan is the patient allowance in place of the $60 standard, not an addition to it. Talk to an accredited representative or elder law attorney about the order in which to apply.

Learn More

VA BenefitsMichigan VA Senior Care Benefits (Hub)A guide to VA senior care benefits in Michigan for 2026: Aid & Attendance, Veteran-Directed Care, the PCAFC stipend, State Veterans Homes, and how to apply. CaregiverHow to Get Paid as a Family Caregiver in MichiganSix Michigan programs that pay family caregivers in 2026: Home Help, MI Choice, VA benefits, and more. Who qualifies, what they pay, how to apply. Care TypesMichigan Assisted LivingMichigan 'assisted living' is really Adult Foster Care or a Home for the Aged. 2026 costs, how Medicaid and VA help pay, and how to choose a facility. Care TypesMichigan Memory CareA 2026 guide to Michigan memory care: what it costs, how MI Choice and VA Aid & Attendance can help pay, and what to look for in a dementia-capable facility. FinancialHow to Pay for Senior Care in MichiganEvery way to pay for senior care in Michigan in 2026: Medicare, Medicaid, VA, LTC insurance, reverse mortgages, caregiver agreements, and cost benchmarks.

Find personalized help applying for VA benefits in Michigan at brevy.com.

The information on Brevy.com is for educational purposes only and is not a substitute for professional legal, financial, or medical advice. Rules vary by state and program and change frequently. Always verify with the relevant agency or a qualified professional. Brevy is not a law firm, financial advisor, or healthcare provider.

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Expert eldercare guidance from Brevy's team of healthcare professionals and researchers.