When I was a little girl, hiding in the hall watching my mom cry with worry that we would get evicted during tough financial times made a huge impression on me. That sense of insecurity was one of many things that drove me to serve in the military: I swore that my own children would never experience the same anxiety.
The drive to own a home was so powerful that I took advantage of my first VA-backed home loan at my first permanent duty station in the Army. I used it again to buy a house once I was a civilian, and it was meaningful for me and my husband to have our own home when we had children.
Many others share the tremendous pride and deep sense of safety that comes from purchasing a home with VA’s support – just watch Nicole’s touching testimonial:
Over the past decade, Women Veterans have made up roughly 10 percent of Veterans and Servicemembers who use their VA home loan benefit. In FY15, nearly 66,000 Women Veterans obtained VA-guaranteed loans totaling nearly $16 billion. Over the past five years, over 270,000 Women Veterans have taken advantage of their home loan benefit.
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Every Veteran should know that this tremendous benefit, which allows you to buy a home with no money down and no private mortgage insurance, can be used more than once – and that due to a combination of sensible underwriting requirements and available support, VA-backed loans have a very low foreclosure inventory rate. Last fiscal year alone, VA and private-sector mortgage servicers worked to help more than 97,000 Veterans, Servicemembers, and their families avoid foreclosure. Get more details and learn more about how to request a Certificate of Eligibility on ExploreVA.
In addition to the VA Home Loan Guaranty program available to all Veterans who meet time in service requirements, VA also provides grants to Servicemembers and Veterans with certain permanent and total service-connected disabilities to help purchase or construct an adapted home, or modify an existing home to accommodate a disability. Three grant programs exist, the Specially Adapted Housing (SAH) grant, the Special Housing Adaptation (SHA) grant, and the Temporary Residence Adaptation (TRA) grant, which allows part of the SAH/SHA grant funds to be used in modifying the home of a family member where a Veteran or Servicemember is living temporarily.
Learn more about the SAH grant benefit, eligibility, and how to apply here.
This is the eighth blog in an 11-week series on the State of Women Veterans. Visit the campaign page to read other entries.
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This is such an amazing article. This series of blog posts on the State of Women Veterans has been a wonderful series. Kayla thank you for sharing your personal inspiration from childhood to successful service member in the Army taking advantage of the amazing VA backed loans. I really want to thank you for your service and would like to ask if it would be OK to share your info-graphic on social media?
I work closely with a lot of small business owners who are prior service men & women. We work one on one and the housing benefit is one that has came up a lot. Veterans getting out of the service have to be aware of the options for housing available to them. Unfortunately a lot of companies do not take care of our veterans like they should.
I am happy to see such a major increase in the amount of veterans being able to avoid foreclosure. We have to take care of our veterans and the VA is so amazing for this. 66,000 Women veterans being able to get guaranteed housing loans is a staggering number and such a blessing. I know that with your personal journey you shared that this must touch close to home for you.
Keep up the amazing work. I would love to share this on social media to try and spread the word more. We need to continue to grow awareness. A lot of prior service veterans are probably unaware of these opportunities.
Every time I try to use my VA loan eligibility there are problems with the lenders. I have worked 10 years to recover from bankruptcy after divorcing an abusive spouse. I have a great job now, pay my bills on time, have a FICO above 620, but repeatedlyget told I don’t qualify because they “score differently for mortgage lending”.
Being a survivor spouse over 29 years I wanted to use my VA eligibility certificate that I’m entitled. The underwriters denied my application what heat broken news.
I am a veteran living in the Washington DC area, affordable homes are hard to find is their a specific va homes list.
I am a veit nam vet.I would like more about what the va.can do for me.