Greenville County Septic Records

Rock Solid handles three separate things under septic records and locating, and they're not the same job:

• Documentation search. We contact SCDES on your behalf and pull whatever permit history exists for your property, at no cost to you.
• Physical locating. We find the tank and drainfield on the ground with a sewer camera, metal detector, and probing equipment, with or without a permit on file. As of August 2026, this runs $300–350.
• New permit assistance. If your property needs a new Permit to Construct, we handle the site evaluation coordination and paperwork with SCDES. As of August 2026, this runs $1,500–2,500.

A few situations bring people to this page. Buying or selling a home is the most common one, since a closing often needs proof of a working, permitted system. Some homeowners have no diagram at all and just want to know where the tank sits before landscaping or building near it. Others are prepping for a repair or a pump-out and need the tank found first. And some need a brand-new permit, either because the existing system is failing or because new construction or an added bedroom increases expected wastewater flow beyond what the old permit covers.

Documentation search and physical locating are separate services, and we run them differently depending on what you need.

Documentation search:

1. Check the system's age. SCDES draws the line at five years for a likely permit on file. Older than that, and we go straight to the locate service instead.
2. Gather your property details: tax map number, lot and block number, address, approximate install date, subdivision name if there is one, and the original permit holder's name if you have it. SCDES may require more if the file is incomplete.
3. Contact the Greenville-Spartanburg SCDES office at 660 Mauldin Rd, Suite 100, Greenville, SC 29607, (864) 372-3273. It covers Greenville County directly, skipping the general Columbia line.
4. Walk you through the results and what they mean for your situation.

Physical locating:

1. Start with whatever you already have: a rough house age, a past contractor's name, an old permit number, or even a neighbor who knows the details.
2. Run a sewer camera from the house's cleanout to trace the pipe straight to the tank inlet.
3. Sweep the yard with a metal detector for the tank lid or riser, then probe to confirm the drainfield lines.
4. Mark the tank, distribution box, and drainfield boundaries on the ground before you landscape or build near them.

A permit search tells you what was approved on paper. A physical locate tells you what's actually in the soil today. For most situations, the physical locate is the answer that matters. Not sure where to start? Call (864) 431-2822 and we'll tell you which path is faster.

If there's no existing permit to find, or the property needs new work that exceeds what the old permit covers, we handle the application process instead. That means coordinating the required SCDES site evaluation, preparing and submitting the Onsite Wastewater System Application (Form D-1740) through the ePermitting Portal, and following up with the regional office until the permit is issued. As of August 2026, this runs $1,500–2,500 depending on site conditions and how much back-and-forth the application needs.

"Greenville doesn't run its own septic records portal the way some counties do. SCDES, the state agency, has a regional office right here in Greenville, but that's not a database you can search yourself. For a home built in the last five years, we can usually request the permit if you give us the tax map number, address, install date, and the original permit holder's name. If it's more than five years or there's nothing found in the SCDES archive, we send someone out to physically find the tank and drainfield instead."

— John "Ivan" Rusev, Co-Owner, Rock Solid Septic & Excavation

Most of the septic installs we take on arrive with a permit already issued. John puts it at about 95%, and it's usually the builder or the homeowner who pulled it. When nobody has, we file the application online. You mark where the house and the septic system will go, and SCDES calls to schedule the field evaluation. Then we bring an excavator to dig the pits the inspector asks for. After that the file waits on SCDES. John's typical turnaround is 1.5 to 3 weeks, and it stretches or shrinks with the office's workload (his estimate as of September 2026).

The documentation search stays free regardless of how much digging through the SCDES archive it takes. For physical locating, the $300–350 range depends on lot size, how much the yard has been built over or landscaped since installation, and whether we're working from any partial records at all. For new permit assistance, the $1,500–2,500 range depends on whether a site evaluation turns up soil or setback issues that need engineering input before SCDES will approve the design.

We locate systems with a sewer camera run from the house's cleanout, a metal detector swept across the yard for the tank lid or riser, and probing equipment to confirm drainfield lines once we have a general area. All of it is run by our own crew, and every locate ends with paperwork. We photograph the yard before we start and again when we finish, and we mark the tank and the drainfield boundaries on the ground. Whatever we disturbed gets restored. You keep a written record with photos that you can hand to a closing attorney or the next contractor.

Septic systems in South Carolina are regulated at the state level. The county government has no authority over the program, which means there's no local health department portal to search. SCDES runs the whole onsite wastewater management program under Regulation 61-56, and staying in compliance is what guides each step from evaluation to final approval. Its GIS map tool confirms that properties here are in the Piedmont region, above the state's Fall Line. That's true for all of Upstate South Carolina, so the tool won't tell you anything permit- or history-specific for your lot. The ePermitting Portal is where you submit or download the Onsite Wastewater System Application (Form D-1740) for active work moving forward, but it won't show you records from a system installed years ago.

SCDES took over the septic program from the former Department of Health and Environmental Control on July 1, 2024. Older permits may still list DHEC. You can also reach the agency's general support line by phone or by email at OSWWCentral@des.sc.gov for broader questions.

When SCDES locates a record, it's usually a Permit to Construct. It shows the approved system design and general location of the tank and drainfield, plus the reserve field that has to stay clear. The state's site evaluation fee is $150, as of July 2026, and once approved, a permit stays valid for five years. SCDES also has to approve any design change before construction proceeds. It's rarely a GPS-precise as-built drawing, the kind you'd get in some other states. Locating a buried tank on an older property still comes down to a site visit. The permit also fixes the tank size, and you don't get to pick it. A 1,000-gallon tank is the minimum, and about 80% of the systems John works on are that size. Once a house goes past roughly four bedrooms, the permit may call for a bigger one, though residential systems seldom top 1,500 gallons. Greenville County has plenty of houses that changed hands or gained an extra room, so compare the bedroom count on the permit with the house as it stands today. A five-bedroom home permitted as a three-bedroom means a system sized for a smaller household than the one living there.

Alex Rusev holds a Tier 3 septic installer license (OSWWI0667), the state's highest tier. John "Ivan" Rusev holds a pumping and hauling license (OSWWP0109). We cover Greenville, Spartanburg, Cherokee, Pickens, and Anderson counties, and estimates are free. New installations carry a 1-year warranty, and septic repairs carry 5 years. If a crew is running late, you hear it from us before you have to call and ask.

Call (864) 431-2822 for a free estimate, whether you need a records search, a physical locate, or help with a new permit.