VA Aid and Attendance in Vermont (2026)

If a wartime veteran in Vermont needs regular help with everyday tasks like bathing, dressing, or eating, VA Aid and Attendance can bring their pension up to $34,488 a year ($2,874 a month) in 2026.1 It's one of the most underused VA benefits, and many Vermont veterans and surviving spouses who qualify never apply because they don't know it exists.

This guide walks through who qualifies, how much you can receive, how to apply, and where to get free help filing in Vermont, including from the Vermont Office of Veterans Affairs and its accredited veterans service officers.

In This Guide

• Key Takeaways
• What Is Aid and Attendance?
• Do You Qualify?
• 2026 Aid and Attendance Rates
• The Net Worth Limit and 3-Year Lookback
• How to Apply for VA Aid and Attendance in Vermont
• Free Help in Vermont: The Office of Veterans Affairs and the Vermont Veterans' Home
• How VA Aid and Attendance Works with Vermont Medicaid
• Frequently Asked Questions

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 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 regular care, so the Aid and Attendance figure is the ceiling on the pension, with the basic rate already inside it rather than added to it.1 This guide covers that pension route, the one the VA describes when it says you may be eligible for this benefit if you get a VA pension. VA Form 21-2680 also covers Aid and Attendance "that will be added to your monthly compensation" benefits, so a veteran who receives VA disability compensation rather than a pension is on a different route from the pension steps below.3

You may qualify if you need help with daily activities such as:

• Bathing or showering
• Dressing and undressing
• Eating (feeding yourself)
• Using the toilet
• Adjusting prosthetic devices
• Protecting yourself from everyday hazards

You can also qualify if you're bedridden, spend a large part of the day in bed because of illness, are a patient in a nursing home because of the loss of mental or physical abilities related to a disability, or have severely limited eyesight (5/200 or less in both eyes).2

The VA pays it as part of the monthly pension payment, so families can put it toward in-home care, assisted living, or nursing home costs.2

Do You Qualify?

To receive Aid and Attendance, you have to meet all four of these requirements.2

1. Wartime service. The length of service the VA requires turns on when active duty started, not on which war the veteran served in.

• Started active duty before September 8, 1980: at least 90 days of active duty, with at least one day during a wartime period.
• Started active duty as an enlisted person after September 7, 1980: generally at least 24 months, or the full period for which they were called or ordered to active duty, with at least one day during wartime.
• Started active duty as an officer after October 16, 1981, without having previously served on active duty for at least 24 months, with at least one day during wartime.

Recognized wartime periods include World War II, the Korean conflict, the Vietnam War era, and the Gulf War, which runs from August 2, 1990 through a future date to be set by law or presidential proclamation.

2. Discharge, age, or disability. The veteran must not have received a dishonorable discharge, and at least one of these four must be true: at least 65 years old; 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 or Supplemental Security Income. Any one of the four satisfies this test on its own, so a wartime veteran under 65 who receives SSI qualifies here without any permanent and total disability rating.2

3. Need for assistance. The veteran or surviving spouse must need regular help with daily activities, be bedridden, be in a nursing home, or have severely limited eyesight as described above.

4. Net worth under $163,699. This is the 2026 limit. It counts your assets and income together with your dependents', as the VA figures them. Your primary residence, your car, and basic home items don't count.1

Surviving spouses qualify too. If the veteran has passed away and the surviving spouse needs help with daily activities, they can apply for the Survivors Pension with Aid and Attendance, worth up to $18,697 a year in 2026.1

2026 Aid and Attendance Rates

The VA calculates your payment as the difference between your countable income and the Maximum Annual Pension Rate (MAPR) for your category. If you have no countable income, you receive the full MAPR. These rates are federal, so they're the same in Vermont as anywhere else.1

The VA publishes these figures as maximum annual pension rates, not monthly payments. To set the monthly payment, federal regulation (38 CFR 3.273) has the VA subtract your countable income from your MAPR and divide what is left by 12.1

Here's how the math works, using hypothetical numbers. If a veteran with a spouse has $12,000 in annual countable income and qualifies for A&A, the VA pays the difference: $34,488 minus $12,000 leaves $22,488 a year, paid in monthly installments. Unreimbursed medical expenses can lower your countable income, which raises the payment, but only the portion above 5% of your MAPR counts. The VA puts it this way: you may deduct only the amount that is above 5% of your MAPR, which is $872 for a veteran with no spouse or child.1

The Net Worth Limit and 3-Year Lookback

The 2026 net worth limit is $163,699. This combines your assets (savings, investments, and property other than your home) with your income, and it counts your dependents' assets and income too.1

What counts: bank accounts, stocks, bonds, investment property, IRAs, and other financial assets, plus your annual income.

What doesn't count: your primary residence, your car, and basic home items. The house you live in doesn't push you over the limit, which matters for the many Vermont veterans who own their homes outright but live on a modest fixed income.

The 3-Year Lookback Rule

The VA reviews any assets you transferred for less than fair market value in the three years before the VA receives your pension claim.2 That 36-month look-back comes from federal regulation 38 CFR 3.276, and it does not reach back to any date before October 18, 2018.1 If you gave away or sold assets below market value to get under the net worth limit, the VA may impose a penalty period of up to five years during which you won't receive pension benefits. Moving money into an annuity, a trust, or another investment that lowers your net worth also counts as a transfer for less than fair market value, unless you can cash out the whole balance for your own benefit, in which case VA counts it as net worth.2

This rule exists to stop people from simply giving away savings to qualify. If you're thinking about transferring assets, talk to a VA-accredited attorney or an elder law attorney first. The penalty can be steep, so it's worth getting advice before you move money.

How to Apply for VA Aid and Attendance in Vermont

These are the steps on the pension route, which is the path for a wartime veteran seeking Aid and Attendance as part of a VA pension. It takes two forms and a medical exam.3

Documents to Gather First

• DD-214 (discharge papers) showing wartime service dates
• Medical records documenting the need for daily help
• Income documentation (Social Security and pension statements)
• Asset information (bank and investment statements)
• Marriage certificate, if claiming as a veteran with a spouse
• Death certificate, if applying as a surviving spouse

Free Help in Vermont: The Office of Veterans Affairs and the Vermont Veterans' Home

You don't have to file this claim alone. The Vermont Office of Veterans Affairs advises veterans not to apply by themselves, and an accredited VSO representative's services on a VA benefit claim are always free.4

The Vermont Office of Veterans Affairs

The Vermont Office of Veterans Affairs runs a Veteran Service Officer (VSO) program for veterans applying for federal VA benefits. It advises that veterans applying for Disability Compensation or Improved Pension from the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs should not do this by themselves: its certified service officers will complete the application and make sure the VA has all the information needed to process it, which increases the chances of success and helps prevent delays.4 An accredited VSO representative's services on a VA benefit claim are always free, though an accredited attorney or claims agent can charge fees.4 To speak with a Veteran Service Officer, call 802-828-1082. The office is at 118 State Street in Montpelier; its main line is (802) 828-3379 and its toll-free number, for Vermont only, is (888) 666-9844.4

Because Vermont is a small state, you may not have a county-level office like veterans in larger states do, so the state Office of Veterans Affairs is the central place to start. The VA's National Center for Veterans Analysis and Statistics puts Vermont's veteran population at 36,343 for 2025 in its FY2025 Vermont state summary, a modelled estimate, and 52.5% of them are 65 or older, against 45.8% nationally.6 Reaching out early, rather than waiting until a care crisis forces the issue, gives the office time to build a strong claim.

The Vermont Veterans' Home

Vermont also has a home for veterans. The Vermont Veterans' Home in Bennington is a residential and healthcare campus serving veterans, their spouses, and Gold Star parents. It is a licensed healthcare facility whose services include short-term and long-term care, post-operative wound care, intravenous medications, physical, speech, and occupational therapy, and a certified dementia unit, with nursing care supervised by a registered nurse twenty-four hours a day, year-round. The National Association of State Veterans Homes lists its capacity as 130 nursing care beds and 8 domiciliary beds.7 Eligible veterans are those who served at least ninety days in the Armed Forces of the United States and were discharged under honorable conditions; spouses of qualified veterans and Gold Star parents are also eligible for admission, and Vermont veterans have priority. The Home accepts private payment, Medicare, and Vermont Medicaid (other insurers may require special arrangements), and it states that if you are a service-connected disabled veteran with a rating of 70% or higher, the VA will cover your stay. The Home also states that it is not affiliated with the Department of Veterans Affairs.7 For a veteran weighing nursing care, an A&A award can help cover costs whether they stay at home or move into the Home.

A word of caution: be wary of companies that charge fees to help with VA claims. An accredited attorney or claims agent can charge fees, but an accredited VSO representative's services on a VA benefit claim are always free, including through the Vermont Office of Veterans Affairs.4

How VA Aid and Attendance Works with Vermont Medicaid

Aid and Attendance and Vermont Medicaid are run separately, by different agencies and under different rules. Vermont's long-term care Medicaid is administered by the Department of Vermont Health Access (DVHA) and includes the Choices for Care program. A veteran can potentially receive both at the same time, but the two count money differently, so a few points are worth understanding.8

• A&A income doesn't automatically disqualify you from Vermont Medicaid. At the eligibility step, a state applies SSI income methodology to aged, blind, and disabled applicants, and under SSI rules a VA aid-and-attendance or housebound allowance is not income, so generally only the basic pension amount, not the A&A increase, counts toward the Medicaid income limit. States that use eligibility criteria more restrictive than SSI may count it, so the state's own rule governs there.8 Separately, for VA purposes, unreimbursed medical expenses can be deducted from countable income, but only the part above 5% of your MAPR.1
• The two programs pay in different ways. A&A comes as part of the monthly VA pension payment, while Medicaid long-term care pays for covered services, so ask DVHA what Choices for Care will and won't pay for in your loved one's setting before you count on either for a particular bill.8
• VA pension income affects your Medicaid share of cost, and Vermont's rule says what comes off first. At the post-eligibility step, income that was disregarded in determining eligibility must be counted back in. Vermont then applies its own rule, § 24.04, "Allowable deductions from patient-share." When it determines the actual patient share, it lists "VA payments for aid and attendance paid to a veteran residing in a nursing facility or to the veteran's surviving spouse residing in a nursing facility" among the items "deducted from the individual's gross income." So under § 24.04, a Vermont nursing-facility resident's Aid and Attendance payment is deducted from gross income when DVHA works out the patient share. The rule then takes a second set of deductions, in order: "a standard personal needs deduction (PNA)" for someone in an institutional setting, or a community maintenance allowance for someone in a home and community-based setting; home-upkeep expenses where they apply; allocations to a community spouse or family members living at home; and reasonable medical expenses incurred. A family with a spouse or dependent relative still at home should ask DVHA for that allocation by name. Ask DVHA for the deductions and amounts that apply to your case before you budget. Ask specifically about a home and community-based setting such as Choices for Care: § 24.04 writes the Aid and Attendance deduction for nursing-facility residents, so that setting is DVHA's to confirm. Separately, under federal law a veteran with neither a spouse nor a child, or a surviving spouse with no child, who is covered by a Medicaid plan for nursing-facility services may be paid no more than $90 a month in VA pension for any period after the month of admission. The facility's Medicaid payment can't be reduced by that capped pension, so the facility can't count it toward the cost of care, and under SSI income rules the reduced pension is an aid and attendance allowance, not income.8 That $90 cap does not reach a veteran in a State veterans home for which the VA pays a nursing-home per diem; there, a separate federal rule counts pension above $90 a month as income only toward the home's cost of nursing care. Whether that $90 comes in addition to Vermont's personal needs deduction or instead of it is governed by Vermont's own post-eligibility rules: never assume the two stack, and never add them together. Confirm with DVHA.8
• Timing matters. The right order in which to apply for the two programs varies by situation and by Medicaid rules, and so does the precise treatment of VA pension income, so confirm how DVHA will treat the benefit before you file, ideally with an accredited Vermont veterans service officer or DVHA itself.8

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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.