Beaufort County GIS and Property Records

Three county offices hold what people usually mean by “property records.” The GIS department draws the map: parcel lines and the county’s mapping apps. The Assessor holds each parcel’s appraisal and tax record. The Register of Deeds holds the recorded documents, such as deeds, mortgages, plats and liens. All three are online, and none of them has an office on Hilton Head Island: the Assessor and Register of Deeds are at 100 Ribaut Road in Beaufort.

For what a tax bill is and how to pay it, see the property taxes guide. For the Town’s side of land use, zoning and permits, see the Town of Hilton Head Island guide. The Beaufort County guide lists the rest of what the county runs.

Beaufort County’s GIS department publishes its maps through the Beaufort County Geographic Info Hub, which gathers all of the county’s mapping applications in one place, parcel searches among them. The county’s Beaufort County Connect app is linked from the GIS page, too.

The GIS map is the quickest way to see where a parcel’s lines run and what is next to it. Questions about the data go to the GIS department through the county’s CitizenGram form. Maps for visiting, not property work, are on our Hilton Head Island map page.

The county’s property search is the Assessor’s Public Access site at sc-beaufort.publicaccessnow.com. It is where you look a property up for its appraisal and assessment. The Assessor appraises real property and mobile homes, and a property is reassessed in the year after a sale, a transfer of ownership or new construction, not countywide on a set cycle.

If you think an appraisal is wrong, the Assessor takes appeals online, and the Appeal Viewer shows where yours stands. The Assessor’s office, at (843) 255-2400, is at 100 Ribaut Road, Room 210, in Beaufort.

For short-term rental owners: the Assessor also decides whether a home gets the 4% legal-residence rate or the 6% rate that applies to a rental. That is a large difference in the tax bill, covered on the property taxes page.

The Register of Deeds records deeds, mortgages, plats, liens, financing statements, powers of attorney, trusts and death certificates, and keeps them searchable online. Current records are on the county’s public records search. Records through February 19, 2026 are in the earlier records search, the system the county used before it upgraded.

The office is at 100 Ribaut Road, Beaufort, and takes calls at (843) 255-2555 from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. on weekdays. Copies are $0.50 a page, and a certified copy adds $10 a document. The office says plainly that it does not perform official searches, so a title search for a purchase goes through an attorney. To record a document, email the office; it handles requests in the order received.

Buying on the island? Our Hilton Head real estate guide covers the market, and the Register of Deeds covers the paperwork once a closing is done.