Skip to main content
All free toolkits
Free companion toolkit

The Veteran's Financial Playbook

Your reading, guides, and worksheets in one place. Start with a guide, then choose the tools you need.

Free downloads. No book purchase or signup required.
READ & UNDERSTAND

Start with a field guide

Cover of Organizing Your Benefits and Money
FREE FIELD GUIDE · PDF

Organizing Your Benefits and Money

Organizing Your Benefits and Money walks twelve steps: verify your VA payment, confirm dependents with VA Form 21-686c, note what is taxable, sort income, size an emergency fund to the gap, track what changes your payment, and screen out claim sharks. Education only.

WORKSHEETS & TOOLS

Put it on paper

First page of the Five Ten Twenty worksheet
FREE WORKSHEET / TOOL · PDF

Five Ten Twenty

Five, ten and twenty years each protect something different. Explains rating reduction protections, the 30-day hearing and 60-day evidence windows, with a fillable rating inventory.

First page of the Not All Five worksheet
FREE WORKSHEET / TOOL · PDF

Not All Five

Aid and Attendance does not require failing all five factors. Explains the real helplessness test, factor five on safety and the housebound routes, with a fillable two-week helper log.

First page of the Two More Questions worksheet
FREE WORKSHEET / TOOL · PDF

Two More Questions

A death certificate answers only one DIC question. Explains contributory cause and the ten-year total rating route, with a fillable record worksheet for surviving families.

First page of the VA Math Worksheet worksheet
FREE WORKSHEET / TOOL · PDF

VA Math Worksheet

Why 50, 30 and 20 make 70, not 100. Walks through VA's combined ratings math, the bilateral factor and rounding mistakes, then gives a fillable worksheet to check your own decision letter.

First page of the Work History Record worksheet
FREE WORKSHEET / TOOL · PDF

Work History Record

TDIU is a different door, not a rating you climb to. Explains the percentage rules, marginal employment and the Census threshold, then gives a fillable job-by-job work history record.

Help from an accredited Veterans Service Officer is always free. Find one at va.gov/get-help-from-accredited-representative.

Want a short email when VA rates change each December, when a big rule changes, or when a new guide comes out? Get rate-change emails. It's optional.