Disabled Veteran Benefits in New Jersey

The full exemption is the one that changes a household budget. New Jersey grants a full property tax exemption on your principal residence if you are honorably discharged, a legal resident, own and live in the home, and hold a VA certification stating you are 100% permanently and totally disabled from active duty service.

Below that, the benefit is flat. An honorably discharged veteran with active duty service gets a $250 deduction every year, and the state's list of requirements includes no disability rating. You have to own the property and be a legal resident as of October 1 of the year before the tax year. Reservists and National Guard members qualify only if they were called to active duty; active duty for training does not count.

Both benefits can pass to a surviving spouse or civil union or domestic partner who has not remarried. For the exemption, the veteran must have been 100% permanently and totally disabled. You apply at town hall, not with the state: Form D.V.S.S.E. goes to your local assessor for the exemption, and Form V.S.S. to the assessor or tax collector for the $250.

New Jersey does not tax a U.S. military pension or survivor's benefit payments, and tells you not to report them on your state return. The catch is a federal civil service pension: that one is taxable here even when it is built partly on credit for your military service.

On disability pay, the state's wording is narrower than you might expect. The resident return instructions list "Permanent and total disability, including VA benefits" among items that should not appear on your return. The military tax guide says New Jersey does not tax total and permanent disability income, tells you not to report those payments, and names VA Disability Compensation as a payment that qualifies. Neither document addresses a partial rating separately.

Then there is the $6,000 veteran exemption, which has no rating requirement. A veteran honorably discharged from active duty can claim it on top of their other exemptions, on a resident or nonresident return. It does not pass to a surviving spouse.

The everyday benefit is the Disabled Veteran placard. State law exempts a disabled veteran from municipal parking meter fees for up to 24 hours when the vehicle is theirs, they are driving or riding in it, and it shows the placard. You apply with proof of status (your DD-214 and your VA award of disability letter) and Form SP-47 at any Motor Vehicle Commission agency or by mail, and you recertify every 3 years.

Know its limit. The placard cannot be used in spaces marked for persons with a disability.

Free registration is rare. The Commission lists two groups: veterans blinded in war service who are eligible for state compensation, and veterans with a service-connected disability who qualified for a free automobile from the VA and drive a specially equipped vehicle. The Commission lists the Disabled American Veterans plate at $15. Two smaller savings: money the VA gives you to buy a car is not subject to sales tax (anything you add out of pocket is), and adding the Veteran designation to a license you already hold is done at no fee.

The answer today is no. What exists is a proposal.

Assembly Bill 3509, pre-filed for the 2026 session, would require the New Jersey Turnpike Authority and the South Jersey Transportation Authority to set up a program exempting disabled veterans from E-ZPass tolls. Under the bill you would need a vehicle you own or lease, registered in New Jersey with a Disabled Vet license plate, and an active E-ZPass account.

It is a bill, not a law. The version on the Legislature's site is the text as introduced. Until it passes, you pay tolls like everyone else.

This is New Jersey's most generous benefit below the top rating. An honorably discharged resident veteran with a service-connected disability of any degree gets hunting and fishing licenses, permits and stamps free. That includes one free antlered deer permit per season, unlimited antlerless permits, and two free spring turkey permits and one free fall turkey permit.

You have to be certified first, and that step is by mail only. Send Fish and Wildlife your VA letter or card showing a service-connected disability, proof of honorable discharge and proof of New Jersey residency. Once certified, you pick up licenses online or at any license agent. Agents charge you nothing; the online vendor adds a small shipping and handling fee.

State parks are a different story. Current law gives free admission to residents who are 62 or older, totally disabled, or active New Jersey National Guard members. A bill introduced for the 2026 session would add veterans with a service-connected disability of any degree; the Legislature's site shows only the text as introduced, so it is a proposal and not law. Separately, the park service says residents who are disabled may be eligible for a Disability Pass with free entrance, issued only at its Trenton office.

New Jersey calls it absolute veterans preference. Qualified veterans who pass are placed at the top of open competitive lists, ahead of non-veterans, regardless of score. Disabled veterans get the highest preference, above other veterans as well. On promotional lists, veterans are ranked by their scores.

To claim the disabled tier you must be receiving at least 10% disability compensation from the VA. There is a second condition: both tiers require an honorable discharge with active duty service during a qualifying war era. The state lists the eras and the minimum service for each: 90 days for World War II, Korea and Vietnam, and 14 days for the later ones, which also require service in the area of the conflict. It shows Operation Enduring Freedom and Operation Iraqi Freedom as running "to current". Reserve and National Guard training time does not count, and the state warns that federal veterans preference is not the same thing.

The preference reaches family. The spouse of a disabled veteran can use it if the veteran waives their own and the spouse is not already in a civil service job, and a surviving spouse keeps it until remarrying.

New Jersey's state payment is not tied to a rating percentage. It is the Catastrophic Entitlement: $150 a month for a resident whose permanent service-connected disability came from wartime service and is on a short list: loss of sight; amputation of both hands, both feet or one hand and one foot; hemiplegia; paraplegia; osteochondritis with loss of use of both legs; multiple sclerosis with loss of use of both feet or legs; and quadriplegia. A surviving spouse can receive it too.

Tuition help is thin. The state veterans department lists three tuition programs, and none is for the children of a living disabled veteran. War Orphans Tuition Assistance pays $500 a year for four years to children of service members who died in service or from a service-connected disability, or who are missing in action; the child must be 16 to 21 when applying. Children of prisoners of war and those missing in action get free undergraduate tuition at a public or private school in New Jersey.

For veterans themselves, the Veterans Tuition Credit Program reimburses up to $400 a year full time or $200 part time, and only for those on active duty between December 31, 1960 and May 7, 1975.