Eligibility You must have suitable credit, sufficient income, and a valid Certificate of Eligibility (COE) to be eligible for a VA-guaranteed home loan. The home must be for your own personal occupancy. The eligibility requirements to obtain a COE are listed below for Service-members and Veterans, spouses, and other eligible beneficiaries.

A VA home loan can be used to:

• Buy a home, a condominium unit in a VA-approved project

• Build a home

• Simultaneously purchase and improve a home

• Improve a home by installing energy-related features or making energy efficient improvements

• Buy a manufactured home and/or lot.

Eligibility Requirements for a VA Home Loan
Service members and Veterans
To obtain a COE, you must have been discharged under conditions other than dishonorable and meet the service requirements in the chart below.

Spouses The spouse of a Veteran can also apply for home loan eligibility under one of the following conditions:
 

• Non-remarried spouse of a Veteran who died while in service or from a service connected disability, or

• Spouse of a Service-member missing in action or a prisoner of war

• Surviving spouse who remarries on or after attaining age 57, and on or after December 16, 2003
  (Note: a surviving spouse who remarried before December 16, 2003, and on or after attaining age 57, just have applied no later than December 15, 2004, to establish home loan eligibility. VA must deny applications from surviving spouses who remarried before December 6, 2003 that are received after December 15, 2004.)

 

 

• Surviving Spouses of certain totally disabled veterans whose disability may not have been the cause of death

• Other Eligible Beneficiaries You may also apply for eligibility if you fall into one of the following categories:

• Certain U.S. citizens who served in the armed forces of a government allied with the United States in World War II

• Individuals with service as members in certain organizations, such as Public Health Service officers, cadets at the United States Military, Air Force, or Coast Guard Academy, midshipmen at the United States Naval Academy, officers of National Oceanic & Atmospheric Administration, merchant seaman with World War II service, and others

• Restoration of Entitlement Veterans can have previously-used entitlement "restored" to purchase another home with a VA loan if:

•  

The property purchased with the prior VA loan has been sold and the loan paid in full, or
A qualified Veteran-transferee (buyer) agrees to assume the VA loan and substitute his or her entitlement for the same amount of entitlement originally used by the Veteran seller. The entitlement may also be restored one time only if the Veteran has repaid the prior VA loan in full, but has not disposed of the property purchased with the prior VA loan. Remaining entitlement and restoration of entitlement can be requested through the VA Eligibility Center by completing VA Form 26-1880.

 

*If you do not meet the minimum service requirements, you may still be eligible if you were discharged due to (1) hardship, (2) the convenience of the government, (3) reduction-in-force, (4) certain medical conditions, or (5) a service-connected disability.