The deadline is quickly approaching for veterans and their families to sign up for additional homestead tax credits recently approved for some disabled veterans. The governor signed the bill into law providing the new benefits on Memorial Day.
Iowa Department of Veterans Affairs director Bob King says the deadline to file is July 1st. “The veterans who qualify for the hundred percent service-connected disability property tax exemption, should go to the Department of Revenue website, which is iowa.gov/tax. And on there they will find the form,” King says.
King says the forms are also available on the Veterans Affairs Department website. “They should fill out that form. They should obtain the updated disability letter from the Department of Veterans Affairs. Take that to the county assessor’s office and make application for the exemption,” King explains.
Time is running out for those who need to sign up. “We have worked very closely with the Iowa Department of Revenue, which is working the assessors to ensure that we get all the information out there,” King says. “There’s a lot of individual circumstances that apply to only a few or maybe one or two, but we are trying to work through those to get the information out the veterans,” King says.
The law is retroactive to January 1st of this year, but eligible veterans and families must complete and submit the form to their county assessor by the July 1st deadline to receive the property tax exemption for 2014.