Start at Charleston’s Elevation Certificates page and follow its Mapnet route to the actual certificate file. Save that building document separately from any flood-map result. A missing City download is not proof that no certificate exists.
Download the certificate the City actually holds
The City documents an address or parcel selection in Mapnet, with a matching certificate link at the bottom of the property information. It also describes an optional Elevation Certificates layer. Contact the City if an offered file fails to download.
Its holdings cover City jurisdiction. Some certificates are missing from City records, and some properties have none. The separate all-properties list linked on the page is dated July 2020.
Once you have a file, inspect the document itself. A filename or map pin is a locator; the paper itself tells you which building and date it describes. Make a short note of:
- The premises and building identified by the document, including any unit or building distinction it actually gives.
- The date printed on the certificate and any clearly identified later revision; keep the date you downloaded it separately.
- Who prepared or certified the document, as shown, without treating an unreadable signature as an identified professional.
- The official download location and the filename, so another person can distinguish this copy from a similarly named file.
If the file concerns another structure on the site, stop that match and keep its measurements and date with that structure. Where a detail is unclear, preserve the uncertainty rather than transcribing a guess.
When several certificate files appear, retain each copy under its own date and building description. Keep pages from different files apart, even when combining them would look like one complete certificate. If a date, signature area or building reference is unreadable, tell staff which part of the copy is unclear. A file’s upload date should stay a retrieval clue rather than become a guessed survey or certification date. Your note can identify the missing evidence without resolving what the document itself leaves uncertain.
Compare the building file with a separate FEMA product
FEMA’s Flood Hazard Mapping Updates overview distinguishes a Flood Insurance Rate Map (FIRM), the National Flood Hazard Layer (NFHL) database and Letters of Map Change (LOMCs). A LOMA or LOMR-F can concern a property or structure; a LOMR revises map information.
Those are different records from the City-held certificate. Keep the effective map’s panel and date, any relevant determination letter and its coverage together, while retaining the certificate’s own identity and date. A matching address still leaves each document answering its own question.
For example, a fictional folder might contain a certificate dated several years before the map currently being consulted. That gap alone leaves open whether the certificate was replaced, the map is mistaken or the building has changed. First identify which document answers the question: the dated building information, the effective mapped designation or the terms of a particular letter.
If the unresolved issue is the map’s layer or publication stage, the Charlotte flood-map stages example shows how to keep those labels separate. Use it as a comparison method only; Charleston’s map program and rules are its own.
City, County or town: who holds the certificate
The City of Charleston holds certificates only for its own jurisdiction. For properties in unincorporated Charleston County and in Awendaw, Hollywood, McClellanville, Meggett, Ravenel, Rockville and Seabrook Island, Charleston County Building Inspection Services keeps copies for new construction and substantially improved structures and says a structure built in those areas since the late 1970s may have one on file. The County takes requests at BuildingServices@CharlestonCounty.org with the address or tax map number, and a research fee applies. Other incorporated towns in the county answer for their own areas.
For a recent City building in a flood zone, expect more than one certificate. The City’s construction close-out checklist dated April 23, 2025 calls for an under-construction elevation certificate to be approved before rough inspections, and a finished-construction certificate before the building final inspection is requested. If your file holds only one, its stage label tells you which one is missing:
- Only the under-construction certificate: ask whether a finished-construction certificate was approved before the final inspection.
- Only a finished-construction certificate: that is the one that describes the completed building; the earlier one is mainly construction history.
- Neither, for a building that predates current rules: ask the City floodplain office (floodplain-info@charleston-sc.gov) whether any certificate is on file before ordering a new survey.
Neither the City nor the County surveys buildings to produce a certificate. If none exists, a new one has to come from a South Carolina licensed surveyor or engineer using the current FEMA form.
When Mapnet supplies no usable file
The City Records Center lists Elevation Certificate holdings from approximately the 1980s to present and points to Mapnet. That describes the collection as a whole; individual properties can have gaps. The page provides records-staff contact information and notes that some research requests may require FOIA.
Describe the gap precisely when asking staff for help: no matching file, a download that fails, an unreadable copy or a document for a different building. Include the City property address, approximate certificate date if known and the specific file you need.
A construction-history question belongs with the Charleston permit-records-by-era guide. Finding a permit or occupancy record there would still leave the certificate and flood-map comparison to be made on their own documents.
Horry County organizes its certificates differently, by year and permit number; see how to find a Horry County elevation certificate.
City of Charleston, Charleston County and FEMA pages checked October 20, 2026.