Texas Veterans: Land, Homestead & Property
Texas has a long history of providing land, homeownership, property-tax and other benefits to those who served. Finding those programs: however, can mean navigating state agencies, federal programs, county appraisal districts and separate eligibility requirements. This hub brings those resources together in one place so Texas Veterans, Military Members and their families can better understand where to begin.
The programs below are run by several different organizations: a Texas state agency, a board within that agency, a federal agency, your county appraisal district, a university extension service and a handful of independent nonprofits. Knowing which one you are dealing with matters, because each sets its own rules and each makes its own decisions. This page keeps them separate and sends you to the organization that can actually answer your question.
Understanding the GLO and the VLB
Two names come up constantly when Texans research veteran land benefits, and they are not the same thing.
The Texas General Land Office (GLO) is a Texas state agency whose history runs back to the Republic of Texas. It carries broad responsibility for state land and related programs.
The Texas Veterans Land Board (VLB) was created in 1946, when the Texas Legislature passed the Veterans Land Act. The VLB operates within that same Texas framework and administers specific programs for qualifying Veterans, Military Members and their families: land loans, home loans, home improvement loans, Texas State Veterans Homes and Texas State Veterans Cemeteries.
In short: the GLO is the agency, and the VLB is the board within it that runs the veteran programs described on this page.
Texas Veterans Land Board contact information
- Texas Veterans Call Center
- 1-800-252-8387
- Hours
- Monday–Friday, 7:30 a.m. – 5:30 p.m. Central Time
- VLBinfo@glo.texas.gov
This is contact information for the Texas Veterans Land Board, not for Texas Homestead Law. We cannot check the status of a VLB application, and we do not determine eligibility for any VLB program.
Find the resource you need
Six starting points, depending on what you are trying to do. Each one hands off either to a detailed page here or to the organization that runs the program.
Buy Texas Land
Texas Veterans and Military Members may have access to the Veterans Land Board Land Loan Program, financing built specifically for buying land in Texas, with its own rules about the tract itself.
Buy a Texas Home
The VLB also runs a housing assistance program for qualifying Veterans and Military Members buying a home in Texas. Loan amounts and rates are set by the VLB and change over time.
Improve Your Home
Repairs and improvements to an existing Texas home may be financed through VLB home improvement lending for those who qualify.
Property Tax Exemptions
Texas law provides partial exemptions for qualifying disabled veterans and certain survivors, and a total residence-homestead exemption in specific circumstances. Which form you file depends on which exemption you are claiming.
Surviving Spouses & Families
Homestead rights: veteran property-tax exemptions, inheritance, probate and heir property all interact after a death, and the rules are rarely obvious from the outside.
Native American Veterans
Native American veterans may have access to federal, tribal, state, land, housing, burial, healthcare and other resources that intersect with both veteran status and tribal citizenship or eligibility.
Farming & Ranching
Federal farm loans through USDA, agricultural programs through Texas A&M AgriLife, and veteran-focused farm training run by independent nonprofits, kept clearly separate from one another.
Veteran property-tax exemptions in Texas
This is the question we are asked most often, so it is worth a short orientation before you go to the full guide.
Texas law provides partial property-tax exemptions for property owned by disabled veterans, and by surviving spouses and surviving children of deceased disabled veterans. The exemption amount is tied to the veteran's percentage of service-connected disability.
Texas law also provides a total residence-homestead exemption for a disabled veteran awarded 100 percent disability compensation due to a service-connected disability, together with a rating of 100 percent disabled or of individual unemployability from the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs. Certain surviving spouses may also qualify, subject to restrictions, and a residence homestead application must be filed to claim it.
Separate total exemptions exist for the surviving spouse of a service member killed or fatally injured in the line of duty, and for the surviving spouse of a veteran who died as a result of a qualifying condition or disease. Homeowners who qualify for a disabled-veteran exemption may also have options regarding property-tax deferral.
Exemptions are granted by your county appraisal district: not by the state, and not by us. The chief appraiser makes the determination.
Buying land is its own subject
A VLB loan and a Texas residence homestead are not automatically the same legal concept, and financing a tract does not resolve the questions that come with rural acreage. If you are moving toward a land purchase, these existing guides cover the ground that most often surprises buyers:
- Texas water rights and land, water & development
- Agricultural valuation and working lands
- Eminent domain
- Solar development, data centers and what they mean for neighbouring land
- Conservation easements
- Trespass notice, purple paint and property signs
- Finding deeds, plats and appraisal records by county
Texas Homestead Law is a free educational resource. We do not determine eligibility, administer government programs: provide legal, tax, lending or benefits advice, or originate loans. We do not represent the Texas General Land Office, the Texas Veterans Land Board, the USDA, the Farm Service Agency, the Texas Comptroller of Public Accounts, the Texas A&M University System, or any other organization linked from this section. Every program described here is run by the organization named, and only that organization can tell you whether you qualify.
Disasters affect veteran homeowners and landowners the same as anyone else, and the property-tax deadlines are short. See Texas Disaster Recovery & Property Resources.
Native American Veterans may also have access to the VA Native American Direct Loan for homes on qualifying Native lands. See Native American & Tribal Rights in Texas.
Sources & references
The Texas General Land Office Veterans section publishes the Texas Veterans Call Center number, its hours of operation and the VLB email address, and describes the loan, Veterans homes and Veterans cemeteries programs administered through the Veterans Land Board.
The GLO's About the VLB page sets out the 1946 Veterans Land Act, the creation and later restructuring of the Board, and the current land loan terms.
The Texas Comptroller of Public Accounts publication Texas Property Tax Exemptions (Publication 96-1740, January 2026) describes the partial disabled-veteran exemptions under Tax Code Sections 11.22 and 11.132, the total residence-homestead exemption under Section 11.131, and the survivor exemptions under Sections 11.133, 11.134 and 11.136, and confirms that chief appraisers determine whether property qualifies.
Program terms, interest rates, loan limits and eligibility rules change. If any statement here conflicts with a current official source, the official source controls.