Guides
The things that are true whether or not I say so
Most of what I write here is my own read on this market. These pages are the opposite: rules set by the state, the county or the courts, that decide what you pay and what you own. Every claim on them cites the statute or the ordinance it came from, with the date I last checked it.
Why these are separate from the blog
Sourced, dated, and not my opinion
A great deal of buying here comes down to my judgement, and that lives on the blog where you can weigh it as one agent’s view. These guides cover the other kind of question — the ones with an actual answer, written down somewhere official. South Carolina’s assessment ratios are in the tax code. What a regime is, is in the Horizontal Property Act. Who has to close your sale was decided by the Supreme Court.
So none of it is asserted on my say-so. Each guide carries its sources at the foot with the date I last opened them, because all of this is amendable and a rule I checked once is not a rule I can vouch for forever.
Property taxes: 4% vs 6%
Two of the questions I am asked most turn on this, and the honest answer is longer than 'four versus six'. The ratio is only half of it — the other half is a school-tax exemption that applies to one and not the other, and a rule that resets your value the year you buy.
Answers
- Are property taxes higher on an investment property than a primary residence?
- What will my property taxes be?
- Why is my tax bill nothing like the seller's?
6 cited sources
Condo, villa, regime, fee simple
Four words that get used interchangeably in listings here and mean four different things — one of which has no legal meaning at all. Out-of-state buyers lose more time to this vocabulary than to anything else on the island.
Answers
- What is a regime? Is that the same as an HOA?
- What is the difference between a condo and a villa?
- What does it mean when a townhome is fee simple?
3 cited sources
Closing with an attorney
Roughly seven in ten of my buyers move here from somewhere else, and a good number of them come from states where a title company runs the closing and no lawyer is involved. South Carolina does not work that way, and it is better to know that early than at the table.
Answers
- Do I need an attorney to buy a house in South Carolina?
- Which parts of the closing must a lawyer handle?
- What is different from a title-company state?
2 cited sources
What SC requires of sellers
Q57 is still unanswered, so how I run a listing isn't on this site yet. What is here is the part that doesn't depend on me at all — what the state obliges a seller to do, what it specifically does not, and the one rule that catches owners who no longer live in South Carolina.
Answers
- What do I legally have to disclose?
- Do I have to disclose a death in the house?
- I live out of state — what gets withheld at closing?
- Who pays the deed recording fee?
7 cited sources
POA, HOA & regime fees
Two gated communities fifteen minutes apart can be structured nothing alike. This is what I check before I let a buyer fall in love with a house, and what I tell every one of them to ask for.
Answers
- Why do communities have both a POA and an HOA?
- What should I ask for before I write an offer?
- How do I judge a community's finances?
4 of these 5 carry cited primary sources. The other one rests on my own experience rather than an outside authority, and says so on the page.
Also sourced
Posts that answer the coastal questions
These sit on the blog because they carry more of my own read on things, but they are cited the same way and cover the questions that decide a purchase near the water.
Flood zones in Beaufort County, and what they actually decide
Your flood zone decides whether a lender can require flood insurance. Since Risk Rating 2.0 it no longer decides the price. Two questions, routinely merged.
Short-term rental rules on Hilton Head, and which rulebook applies to you
Three jurisdictions write short-term rental rules here, and your address decides which governs you. Then your POA gets a vote that overrides all three.
Hurricane season, and the decisions you cannot make in September
Flood cover has a 30-day fuse, evacuation zones are set by address, and wind, flood and homeowners are three separate policies. Sort it out in August.
What is deliberately not here
No millage rate, no tax figure in dollars, and no fee range. Millage is set annually and varies by where a parcel sits, so a number typed here would be wrong for most readers and stale for the rest. The same goes for POA and regime fees. Those are all knowable — just not from a web page that cannot see your address.
I have the current numbers, and the county publishes the rest. (650) 346-3315.
Got a question these don't answer?
Ask me. If the answer is written down somewhere official, I'll send you the link rather than my opinion.