State veteran benefits · MT
Montana Veteran Benefits
Montana's MDV program cuts the property tax rate on a 100 percent disabled veteran's home by 50 to 100 percent depending on income, with the eligible market value raised to $350,000 effective 2024.
By Mario Bailey, U.S. Air Force veteran · current Air National Guard member. Data updated 2026-07-10.
What Montana adds, benefit by benefit
Your federal VA benefits travel with you to any state. Everything below is the second stack: what Montana itself offers, each item checked against the state's own official source on the date shown.
Montana Disabled Veteran (MDV) Assistance Program
Veterans rated 100 percent disabled from service, and their unmarried surviving spouses, get the property tax rate on their owned and occupied primary residence reduced by 50, 70, 80, or 100 percent, with the bracket set by income and marital status. Income limits are adjusted for inflation each year, so a denial in one year is not final.
House Bill 189, passed in the 2023 legislative session and effective for 2024, raised the qualifying income levels and increased the home market value eligible for assistance from $200,000 to $350,000. Apply through the Department of Revenue by April 15.
SOURCE: Montana Department of Revenue · retrieved 2026-07-10
A partial, conditional military retirement exemption
Since January 1, 2024 (Senate Bill 104), Montana exempts up to 50 percent of military retirement income, capped at the taxpayer's Montana-source income from wages, business, or farming. It applies only to retirees who became residents after June 30, 2023 or began drawing military retirement while already residents, and runs for five consecutive years. Survivor benefit recipients can exempt 50 percent regardless of other income. VA disability compensation is never taxed, by Montana or federally.
SOURCE: Montana Department of Revenue · retrieved 2026-07-10
Montana University System veteran tuition waiver
Montana resident veterans with an honorable discharge (general under honorable conditions does not qualify) who at some point qualified for federal VA education benefits but have exhausted them or let them expire can have in-state tuition waived at Montana University System campuses, for undergraduate through doctoral programs. It is a last-dollar award applied after all grants and scholarships, covers tuition only, and you must apply by the third week of the first semester.
SOURCE: Montana University System · retrieved 2026-07-10
Three state veterans homes
Montana operates veterans homes in Columbia Falls, Butte (Southwest Montana Veterans Home), and Glendive (Eastern Montana Veterans Home) for veterans requiring skilled nursing care; spouses and surviving spouses of veterans are also eligible for residence.
SOURCE: Montana Veterans Affairs Division · retrieved 2026-07-10
Three state veterans cemeteries
Montana's state veterans cemeteries sit at Fort Harrison near Helena (opened 1988), Miles City (2002), and Missoula (2008). Burial is low-cost, with free options for cremated remains, and spouses and eligible dependents are entitled to burial with the veteran.
SOURCE: Montana Veterans Affairs Division · retrieved 2026-07-10
Discounted licenses for combat-disabled veterans and Purple Heart holders
Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks offers half-priced deer and antelope licenses to veterans certified by the VA at 70 percent or more service-connected disability from combat-connected injuries, with up to 50 issued annually. Resident Purple Heart recipients may fish and hunt upland game birds with only a conservation license.
SOURCE: Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks · retrieved 2026-07-10
Every Montana benefit comes with a condition attached, and knowing the conditions is the difference between a real stack and a brochure. The MDV property program is the clearest case. It can zero out the tax rate on your home, but only the lowest income bracket gets the full 100 percent reduction, and the brackets move with inflation every year. That design rewards persistence: a veteran denied in 2023 might qualify under the rules in force since 2024, when House Bill 189 lifted both the income limits and the eligible home value to $350,000. If your only income is VA compensation at the 100 percent rate, you are likely in the strongest bracket, and the April 15 deadline is the single date to respect.
The pension exemption tells you exactly who Montana is recruiting. It is not a blanket retiree benefit; it is a five-year, 50 percent exemption capped at your Montana wages or business income, aimed at the military retiree who moves in and keeps working. A retiree who arrived in 2010 and lives on the pension alone gets nothing from it. A retiring master sergeant who takes a job in Kalispell in 2026 gets a meaningful five-year discount. Plan the move and the employment together or the benefit evaporates. Whatever the pension does, the VA check stays untaxed.
The tuition waiver has the most unusual condition in the state system: you must have already used up or aged out of your federal education benefits. That makes the sequencing automatic, spend the Post-9/11 GI Bill first, then hand the MUS waiver the rest of the degree, including graduate school. Veterans who assume the waiver is closed to them because they had Chapter 33 have it backwards; prior federal eligibility is the requirement, not the disqualifier.
Who wins in Montana: a working-age 100 percent P&T veteran who owns a modest home and still earns, or a new-arrival military retiree with a job lined up. The commonly missed item is the smallest one, burial. Cremation interment at the three state cemeteries has free options, spouses are covered, and the federal burial benefits layer underneath, which together make the end-of-life plan nearly costless in a state where private arrangements are not.
Where to apply
State benefits are administered by the state, not by VA, so the applications above run through Montana Veterans Affairs Division or the specific agency named in each source link. A free VA-accredited representative or VSO in Montana will know both stacks, the federal claim and the state paperwork, and charges nothing to help with either.