Alabama Permanently and Totally Disabled Principal Residence Exemption

This is the statewide principal-residence exemption in Code section 40-9-21. The Department of Revenue describes it as homestead type H-3 for disability. A person who is permanently and totally disabled, at any age, is exempt from state, county, and municipal ad valorem tax on the single-family home the person owns and occupies as the principal residence, and on up to 160 acres next to it. The department's table lists no income limit and no assessed-value cap. School tax is not collected on that exemption. The legal test is permanent and total disability. It is not a line on a VA rating chart by itself. The department issues a certificate of permanent and total disability. Its rule grants that certificate automatically to a person who is drawing any pension or annuity from the armed services, a private company, or a governmental agency because the person is permanently and totally disabled. A person who does not qualify that way can submit affidavits from two physicians licensed in Alabama. At least one of those physicians has to be actively treating the disability. The department publishes the physician affidavit. A smaller homestead, under section 40-9-19, still exists for an owner who is not in this full exemption. That ordinary homestead is a cap on assessed value. It is not this exemption. Two acts of the 2026 regular session take effect October 1, 2026, and neither is in section 40-9-21 itself. Act 2026-598 amended section 40-9-21.1 and section 40-7-2.1, the verification sections. Everyone else who holds this exemption still has to verify eligibility every year on the assessor's form. Under the new section 40-9-21.1(b)(2), a veteran "who has been determined to be permanently and totally disabled by the United States Department of Veterans Affairs" and who qualifies under section 40-9-19(d) or 40-9-21 does not have to claim again or verify again after first qualifying. It is the release from annual verification, not the exemption, that ends when that veteran dies or establishes a new homestead. The Department of Veterans Affairs' September 2026 booklet describes the release as covering veterans "claiming this exemption due to a service-connected disability" and cites section 40-9-21, which the act did not amend. The statute needs a VA permanent and total determination. A veteran who holds the exemption on a Department of Revenue certificate without that VA finding still verifies every year. Act 2026-268 added section 40-9-21.3, the Disabled Veterans Property Tax Debt-To-Income Ratio Exemption Act. A tax assessing official issues a tentative certificate of permanent and total disability, before the purchase, to a veteran with a 100 percent VA rating who may claim an exemption under section 40-9-19 or 40-9-21, on receiving a Department of Revenue affidavit, the purchase agreement, and VA documentation of a 100 percent service-connected, permanent, and total disability. The official has 20 days after receiving all three. The certificate becomes a valid certificate of permanent and total disability once the veteran buys the home, and a settlement agent or loan closing officer may not count the ad valorem tax in the veteran's debt-to-income ratio. The act does not create a new exemption. It changes when the veteran can document one the veteran may already claim. Claim the exemption at the county revenue office. In Limestone County that office is the Revenue Commissioner.