Renting in Chesterfield? Here's What You Need to Know Before You Sign

Chesterfield Rental Market Overview

Chesterfield is a 4.1-square-mile town and the seat of Chesterfield County, connected regionally by South Carolina Highway 9, which reaches Cheraw 12 miles east and Pageland 19 miles west, and by SC Highway 145, which leads to McBee and across the state line to Morven, North Carolina. Despite its county-seat status, Chesterfield is South Carolina's least populous county seat -- smaller than Cheraw, the county's largest community. Research for this guide, checked September 2026, identified 2 rental communities inside town: Indian Creek Apartments on Blasengale Street and Chesterfield Apts at 801 East Blvd. A public affordable-housing directory describes both as subsidized or income-based rental-assistance properties accepting housing vouchers, and neither publishes a specific rent or fee amount. Checking each identifiable address against the U.S. Census Bureau's public geocoder found Chesterfield Apts resolves cleanly inside the incorporated Town of Chesterfield; Indian Creek Apartments' listing gives no house number and could not be independently geocoded for this guide.

Common Lease Terms in Chesterfield

No community in Chesterfield publishes a full lease, application, or open-market fee schedule, so terms have to be pieced together from a public affordable-housing directory, HUD's area-wide benchmark figures, and Census jurisdiction verification rather than a single primary lease document:

• Indian Creek Apartments (Blasengale St) is listed as a subsidized rental-assistance property with a short reported wait, accepting housing vouchers; no rent figure is published, and the listing's own address lacks a house number, so this guide could not independently confirm which side of the town line it sits on
• Chesterfield Apts (801 East Blvd) is listed the same way -- subsidized, voucher-accepting, short wait, no published rent figure. Confirmed inside Chesterfield town limits via the Census Bureau's public geocoder
• RentCafe's own market-rent tracker returns no result at all for Chesterfield, since the town falls below its 50-unit-building reporting threshold -- there is no independently tracked "market rate" to cite for comparison
• HUD's FY2026 Fair Market Rent for the area spans $678 (studio) to $1,293 (4-plus bedroom), and a 2024 city-data.com aggregation of Census American Community Survey estimates puts the town's own median gross rent at $819 a month -- both are area-wide statistical benchmarks, not a quoted price for either identified property

Local Tenant Protections

South Carolina law provides the baseline for tenant rights, but Chesterfield may have additional local ordinances that affect your lease.

• South Carolina law preempts local rent control statewide (S.C. Code §27-39-60) -- no South Carolina city or county, including Chesterfield, may enact an ordinance regulating the rent charged on privately owned residential property
• This guide could not locate a codified Town of Chesterfield ordinance on Municode, eCode360, American Legal, or a locatable town website as of September 2026, so no town-specific rental-registration or landlord-licensing provision could be confirmed or ruled out
• Chesterfield hosts Chesterfield County's own administrative complex (178 Mill St) and the county's tourism office (700 West Blvd), both confirmed inside town limits via the Census Bureau's public geocoder -- corroborating the town's county-seat role even without a locatable municipal code of its own
• Checking this guide's identifiable addresses against the Census Bureau's public geocoder found no jurisdiction mismatch: Chesterfield Apts, the county administrative complex, the county tourism office, and the Dr. Thomas E. Lucas House (a National Register property at 716 W. Main St) all resolve inside the incorporated Town of Chesterfield -- a cleaner result than several other small South Carolina towns checked for this guide's series

For full South Carolina statewide tenant rights, see our South Carolina tenant rights guide.

Mandatory Fees at Chesterfield Communities

No fee schedule could be independently verified for either identified Chesterfield community, as of September 2026.

• The public affordable-housing directory that lists Indian Creek Apartments and Chesterfield Apts states program type and wait-list status for each, but publishes no application fee, pet fee, or deposit amount for either
• Subsidized and income-based programs price by household income rather than a posted market rate, and this guide found no source stating a fee schedule for either community
• The town-wide ACS median gross rent estimate ($819/month, per a 2024 city-data.com aggregation of Census American Community Survey data) and HUD's FY2026 Fair Market Rent range ($678-$1,293) are area-wide statistical benchmarks, not a fee or rent figure for either specific community
• South Carolina law sets no statutory cap on application fees, pet fees, or administrative fees -- whatever a specific lease states is what governs

A community with no independently verifiable pricing isn't automatically a red flag in a market this thin -- but it does mean every figure, program type, and wait-list status needs confirming directly with the property before signing anything.

County-Seat Status, Population History, and Chesterfield's Local Economy

Chesterfield's Census-reported population has swung across the last three-and-a-half decades rather than falling in a straight line: 1,373 in 1990, 1,318 in 2000, 1,472 in 2010, and 1,357 in 2020, per Wikipedia's sourced population table. That pattern reads closer to a long plateau in the 1,300s-to-1,400s than a steady exodus -- but the most recent decade is a real, documented decline of 7.8%, and a 2024 city-data.com estimate puts the population at 1,351, consistent with the 2020 figure holding roughly steady since. One current data point worth weighing as a contributing factor: the town's own 2024-estimated median resident age is 48.9, well above South Carolina's statewide median age of 40.7, consistent with an aging population rather than a sudden departure of working-age residents. The same 2024 estimates put median household income at $46,470 against South Carolina's own considerably higher statewide figure, per capita income at $26,680, a poverty rate of 28.3% (45.2% among Black residents, 18.7% among white non-Hispanic residents), and town-level unemployment at 4.2% as of April 2026.

Chesterfield's own role, like several other small South Carolina county seats this guide has covered, is administrative rather than industrial: despite being the county seat, it is South Carolina's least populous one, smaller than Cheraw (the county's largest community, 12 miles east) and hosting the county's own administrative complex at 178 Mill Street -- confirmed inside town limits via the Census Bureau's public geocoder -- along with the Chesterfield County tourism office at 700 West Blvd. Three properties associated with the town are listed on the National Register of Historic Places: the East Main Street Historic District, the West Main Street Historic District, and the Dr. Thomas E. Lucas House at 716 W. Main St, all likewise confirmed or consistent with sitting inside town limits. Chesterfield County's own published list of largest employers -- Black+Decker, Crown Holdings, McLeod Health, Northeastern Technical College, Walmart, and the Chesterfield County School District -- does not specify which of the county's eight municipalities actually hosts each one, so none of them can be confirmed as a Chesterfield-town employer specifically; manufacturing is the county's largest employment sector by a wide margin regardless of exactly where each named employer sits. The Chesterfield County School District does operate directly inside town, running all three schools serving Chesterfield residents: Edwards Elementary (K-5), Chesterfield-Ruby Middle (6-8), and Chesterfield High School (9-12), plus a public library branch.

Common Issues Renters Face in Chesterfield

These are the most frequent considerations this guide's research turned up for renters in Chesterfield:

• Neither community identified in Chesterfield -- both subsidized or income-based -- publishes independently verifiable market-rate pricing, so comparing "Chesterfield rent" to a neighboring town's published figure isn't possible from public sources alone
• Indian Creek Apartments' own directory listing gives no house number on Blasengale Street, which kept this guide from independently confirming via the Census Bureau's geocoder whether the property sits inside town limits or in unincorporated county land -- worth confirming directly before assuming either way
• Chesterfield's population trend is easy to oversimplify: the town isn't in a steady decades-long decline so much as a long plateau that dropped meaningfully in the most recent decade alone (1,472 in 2010 to 1,357 in 2020) -- a "-7.8% this decade" framing is accurate, but a "declining since 1990" framing would overstate what the full record shows
• Chesterfield County's own named largest employers aren't confirmed to sit inside the town whose name anchors the county seat -- the county's own materials don't break the list down by municipality, and Chesterfield is smaller than Cheraw, the county's actual population center, 12 miles away
• RentCafe's own market-rent tracker returns no result for Chesterfield at all, since the town falls below its 50-unit-building reporting threshold -- a landlord citing a "market rate" here has no independently published citywide benchmark to point to

Negotiating Your Lease in Chesterfield

South Carolina is landlord-favorable with minimal statutory protections, and Chesterfield's rental market has no independently published market-rate price to benchmark against at either of its two identified communities.

• Requesting the current income limit, program type, and wait-list length directly from Indian Creek Apartments or Chesterfield Apts is the only way to confirm eligibility and price, since neither publishes a rent figure online
• Confirming Indian Creek Apartments' exact street address and which government -- the Town of Chesterfield or Chesterfield County -- actually governs the property is a reasonable question before a first visit, since this guide's own attempt to verify its jurisdiction via the Census Bureau's geocoder came back inconclusive for lack of a house number
• Comparing a quoted Chesterfield figure against Cheraw, the county's larger and better-documented community 12 miles east, is more attainable than benchmarking against Chesterfield's own ACS town-wide average rent ($819/month), which describes the whole renter-occupied stock rather than any specific unit
• Asking directly about commute distance to Cheraw or elsewhere in the county for employment is a reasonable step for anyone weighing a Chesterfield lease partly on job access, since the county's own named largest employers aren't confirmed to operate inside Chesterfield town limits specifically

A community with no independently verifiable pricing isn't automatically a red flag in a market this thin -- but it does mean every figure, and which government actually governs a specific address, needs confirming directly before signing anything.