New Hampshire's disabled veteran property tax benefit is mainly a credit off your tax bill: $700 a year, or up to $5,000 in a town that has voted the optional credit. What most people search for as the New Hampshire disabled veteran property tax exemption is, in the statute, the Tax Credit for Service-Connected Total Disability under RSA 72:35, and it goes to a veteran with a total and permanent service-connected disability, a veteran who is a double amputee or paraplegic because of a service-connected injury, or the surviving spouse of either.

A full exemption from all property tax on the home does exist in New Hampshire, but only under RSA 72:36-a, and only for a home the VA specially adapted through a Specially Adapted Housing (SAH) or Special Home Adaptation (SHA) grant. Either way, you file with your own town's selectmen or assessors by April 15, not with the VA.

In This Guide

New Hampshire's Veteran Property Tax Benefits at a Glance

New Hampshire has three statutes that matter most to a disabled veteran who owns a home, and they work differently. Two are credits, which New Hampshire law defines as "the amount of money to be deducted from the person's tax bill." The third is an exemption, which comes off the property's assessed valuation instead (RSA 72:29).

Benefit Who qualifies Amount Statute
Tax Credit for Service-Connected Total Disability Veteran with a total and permanent service-connected disability, or a double amputee or paraplegic from a service-connected injury, or the surviving spouse $700 standard; $701 to $5,000 where the town votes the optional credit RSA 72:35
Certain Disabled Veterans exemption Veteran who owns a VA SAH or SHA specially adapted home and meets one of three service-connected disability tests, or the surviving spouse Exempt from all taxation on the homestead RSA 72:36-a
Standard and Optional Veterans' Tax Credit Resident veterans with qualifying wartime service, residents terminated from the armed forces because of service-connected disability, and certain spouses and surviving spouses $50 standard; $51 to $750 where the town votes the optional credit ($51 to $1,000 from April 1, 2027) RSA 72:28

The rest of this guide takes each row in turn, starting with the credit most disabled veterans will actually claim.

Do You Qualify for the New Hampshire Disabled Veteran Tax Credit?

The RSA 72:35 Tax Credit for Service-Connected Total Disability covers any person discharged under conditions described in RSA 21:50, or an officer honorably separated from the U.S. military, who has a total and permanent service-connected disability. The same New Hampshire credit also covers a veteran who is a double amputee or paraplegic because of a service-connected injury, and the surviving spouse of a person in either group.

The New Hampshire disability credit applies only to property occupied as the principal place of abode of the disabled veteran or the surviving spouse. The RSA 72:35 credit can also cover land or buildings appurtenant to the residence, and manufactured housing when that is the veteran's or surviving spouse's principal place of abode. Property you own but don't live in as your principal home is outside the credit.

Proof comes from the VA, not from your town. A New Hampshire applicant for the RSA 72:35 credit must give the assessors or selectmen certification from the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs that the applicant is rated totally and permanently disabled from service connection. Under RSA 72:35, New Hampshire's assessors or selectmen must accept that VA certification as conclusive on the question of disability, unless they have specific contrary evidence and the applicant has had a reasonable opportunity to review and rebut it. Any decision to deny the credit has to identify the evidence it relied on.

How Much Is the Credit Worth in Your Town?

New Hampshire's standard RSA 72:35 disability credit is $700 a year off the property tax on the veteran's residential property. A New Hampshire city or town may instead adopt an optional disability credit of any amount from $701 up to $5,000, and it does that by a vote under RSA 72:27-a that has to specify the amount. That is why two veterans with the same VA rating can see very different credits a few miles apart: the number on your bill is whatever your own town voted.

Two towns show how far apart the figures can land. These are those towns' own published amounts, not a statewide rate.

If your town has not voted the optional credit, the $700 standard credit is what applies, so the first question to put to your assessor is simply which amount your town has adopted.

Under RSA 72:35, any New Hampshire tax credit is divided evenly among the number of tax payments the town or city requires each year, so part of the credit shows up on each bill rather than all of it on one.

The Full Exemption for a Specially Adapted Home

New Hampshire's RSA 72:36-a makes a veteran's homestead "exempt from all taxation," but only when two conditions are met together. The first is the home itself: the veteran must own a home that the VA specially adapted through an approved Specially Adapted Housing (SAH) or Special Home Adaptation (SHA) grant, or a specially adapted home bought with the proceeds from selling such an SAH or SHA home.

The second condition under New Hampshire's RSA 72:36-a is the disability. The veteran must meet one of three tests:

  • Rated 100 percent permanently and totally disabled as prescribed in 38 C.F.R. 3.340, the VA's rule on total and permanent total ratings and unemployability.
  • A double amputee of the upper or lower extremities, or any combination of them, or paraplegic, as the result of service connection.
  • Blindness of both eyes with visual acuity of 5/200 or less, as the result of service connection.

Satisfactory proof of the service-connected disability has to be furnished to the assessors. As one example of what that looks like in practice, the Town of Durham's assessor lists an April 15 deadline for the RSA 72:36-a exemption and asks for the DD-214, VA documentation of the total and permanent service-connected rating, and documentation that the home was specially adapted with Veterans Administration assistance or bought with the proceeds of such a home.

If you own an adapted home and your town has also voted the optional disability credit, read the next section closely, then take the question to your assessor before you file.

Can You Get Both the Disability Credit and the Veterans' Credit?

Not once your town has adopted the optional disability credit. New Hampshire's RSA 72:35, I-a says it directly: "The optional tax credit for service-connected permanent and total disability shall replace the tax credits pursuant to RSA 72:28, 72:28-b, 72:28-c, and 72:36-a in its entirety and shall not be in addition thereto."

This is a change some veterans will remember differently. The Town of Warner's select board explained that HB 99 "prohibits veterans who qualify for the Optional Total and Permanent Service-Connected Disabled Tax Credit" from also receiving the Optional Veterans' Tax Credit, and that the two credits "used to be stackable." The Town of Barrington says the same thing on its own page: its "additional $750 Veteran's Credit will NOT be added" to its disability credit. If you received both credits in the past, check your next bill against what your town now allows rather than assuming last year's total carries forward.

The statute's list also names RSA 72:36-a, the adapted-home provision. How that sentence applies to a particular veteran who owns an SAH or SHA home in a town with the optional credit is something the statute text alone doesn't settle for you, so ask your town's assessors how they apply it to your property.

If You Aren't Rated Totally and Permanently Disabled

New Hampshire's RSA 72:35 disability credit is written for a veteran rated totally and permanently disabled from service connection, or a double amputee or paraplegic from a service-connected injury, so a veteran with a lower rating should look to the general veterans' credit instead.

New Hampshire's Standard and Optional Veterans' Tax Credit under RSA 72:28 is $50 a year as the standard credit. A town may vote an optional veterans' credit of any amount from $51 up to $750, which replaces the $50 standard credit, and under a 2026 amendment that optional range becomes $51 up to $1,000 effective April 1, 2027. The Town of Durham, for example, lists a $500 veterans' tax credit.

The RSA 72:28 veterans' credit has more than one way in. It covers a New Hampshire resident veteran who served not less than 90 days on active service in a qualifying war or armed conflict listed in the statute and continues to serve or was honorably discharged, along with that veteran's spouse or surviving spouse. The RSA 72:28 veterans' credit also covers any New Hampshire resident who was terminated from the armed forces because of service-connected disability, or that resident's surviving spouse, and the surviving spouse of any resident who suffered a service-connected death. For this credit, "resident" means someone who has lived in New Hampshire for at least one year before April 1 of the year the credit is claimed (RSA 72:29, I).

What a Surviving Spouse Should Know

Both of New Hampshire's disability-based benefits name the surviving spouse. The RSA 72:35 disability credit covers "the surviving spouse of such a person," and the credit can be applied to property occupied as the surviving spouse's principal place of abode. The RSA 72:36-a adapted-home exemption extends to the veteran's surviving spouse as well.

Remarriage changes things. Under RSA 72:29, V, "surviving spouse" as used in New Hampshire's RSA 72 does not include a surviving spouse who has remarried. Under RSA 72:29, V, a remarried New Hampshire surviving spouse regains surviving-spouse status if the later marriage ends in divorce, but if the new spouse dies, the person is treated as the widow or widower of the latest spouse and does not go back to being a veteran's surviving spouse.

How to Apply for the New Hampshire Disabled Veteran Property Tax Exemption

Under RSA 72:33, no one in New Hampshire is entitled to the RSA 72:28, 72:35 or 72:36-a veterans' credits or exemption unless they have filed a permanent application with the town's selectmen or assessors by April 15 preceding the setting of the tax rate. The application is signed under penalty of perjury on a form approved and provided by New Hampshire's commissioner of revenue administration (the New Hampshire Department of Revenue Administration lists the state's property tax credits and exemptions), and it has to show that you are the true and lawful owner of the property and that you were qualified on April 1 of the year you first claim the credit. Local assessors identify that form as Form PA-29; the Town of Barrington, for example, requires the Veteran's Credit section of Form PA-29.

1
Step 1

Ask your town which amount it has adopted

The selectmen or assessing office can tell you whether your town uses the $700 standard disability credit or has voted an optional amount.

2
Step 2

Get your VA letter

For the RSA 72:35 credit, you need certification from the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs that you are rated totally and permanently disabled from service connection.

3
Step 3

Complete Form PA-29 and file it with your selectmen or assessors by April 15

You must have owned the property, and been qualified, on April 1 of the first year you claim the credit.

4
Step 4

File again only if you move

A New Hampshire permanent application carries forward each year as long as you don't change residence; if you move, file an amended permanent application on or before December 1 following the move.

Your town's assessing officials may ask you to file supporting information periodically, but under RSA 72:33 no more often than once a year, and not filing it can, at their discretion, cost you the credit for that year.

Missed April 15? Under RSA 72:33, if an otherwise-qualified New Hampshire applicant satisfies the selectmen or assessors that accident, mistake, or misfortune prevented a timely filing, they may accept the application later and grant the credit for that year. Under RSA 72:33, the selectmen or assessors cannot accept a late New Hampshire veterans' credit application after the local tax rate has been approved for that year, so a late filer should move quickly.

If Your Town Says No

If New Hampshire selectmen or assessors refuse an RSA 72:28, 72:35 or 72:36-a credit or exemption, RSA 72:34-a lets the applicant appeal in writing, on or before September 1 following the date of notice of tax, to the New Hampshire Board of Tax and Land Appeals or to the superior court.

Before you appeal a denial of the disability credit, look at what the denial says. Under RSA 72:35, a decision to deny has to identify the evidence it relied on, and your VA certification is conclusive on the question of disability unless the town has specific contrary evidence you were given a reasonable chance to review and rebut.

Frequently Asked Questions

Do 100% disabled veterans pay property taxes in New Hampshire?

A New Hampshire veteran rated totally and permanently disabled from service connection receives the RSA 72:35 credit off the property tax bill: $700 a year, or an amount from $701 up to $5,000 where the town has voted the optional credit. A full exemption from all taxation on the homestead is available under RSA 72:36-a when the veteran also owns a home specially adapted through a VA SAH or SHA grant. Where the town has voted the optional disability credit, RSA 72:35, I-a says that credit "shall replace the tax credits pursuant to RSA 72:28, 72:28-b, 72:28-c, and 72:36-a in its entirety," so a veteran with an adapted home in an optional-credit town should ask the assessors how they apply that sentence before filing.

Can a veteran in combat service apply after New Hampshire's April 15 deadline?

For one credit, yes. Under RSA 72:33, a person may apply for New Hampshire's tax credit for combat service under RSA 72:28-c at any point during the tax year in which the person is engaged in combat service, notwithstanding the April 15 deadline. RSA 72:33 names only the RSA 72:28-c combat credit in that exception; the RSA 72:35 disability credit and the RSA 72:36-a exemption stay on the April 15 permanent-application rule, with its allowance for accident, mistake, or misfortune.

Is the New Hampshire disability credit an exemption?

No, and the difference shows up in how you read your bill. Under RSA 72:29, a New Hampshire tax credit is "the amount of money to be deducted from the person's tax bill," so the RSA 72:35 disability credit's dollar amount ($700, or your town's optional amount) is the dollar amount taken off what you owe, not a cut to your home's assessed value.

Do I have to reapply every year?

Generally not. A New Hampshire permanent application carries forward each year as long as you don't change residence, though assessing officials may ask for supporting information up to once a year.

I'm 65 or older. Is there a separate senior break?

Yes, and it runs on age rather than your VA rating. The New Hampshire Elderly Exemption is a local-option exemption that reduces the home's assessed value; each municipality sets its own amounts and income and asset limits, and an applicant must be 65 on or before April 1 and have lived in New Hampshire for at least 3 consecutive years before April 1 of the year claimed. It is also applied for on Form PA-29. Our New Hampshire senior property tax relief guide walks through it.

Learn More

VA BenefitsDisabled Veteran Property Tax Exemption by StateMost states fully or partially exempt a service-connected disabled veteran's home from property tax. See how the three models work and find your state. VA BenefitsVA Benefits You Can Use for Senior Care in New HampshireA guide to VA senior care benefits in New Hampshire: home care, nursing homes, Aid and Attendance, the state veterans home, and how to access them in 2026. FinancialNew Hampshire Senior Property Tax ReliefNew Hampshire's Elderly Exemption is set by each town, not the state. Learn state-law income floors, how amounts vary and how to file Form PA-29. VA BenefitsVA Aid and Attendance in New HampshireVA Aid and Attendance in New Hampshire for 2026: who qualifies, rates up to $2,874 a month, how to apply, and free help filing your claim in NH. VA BenefitsMassachusetts Disabled Veteran Property Tax ExemptionMassachusetts disabled veteran property tax exemption: at least $400 under Clause 22, $750 to $1,500 at 22A to 22C, and full exemptions at 22D, 22F and 22H. VA BenefitsConnecticut Disabled Veteran Property Tax ExemptionConnecticut's disabled veteran property tax exemption is claimed at your town assessor, not the VA. A 100% permanent and total rating fully exempts your home.

Find personalized help filing Form PA-29 for New Hampshire's disabled veteran property tax credit 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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