Summerville, South Carolina.
Typical home $379,971 (-0.5% in a year), asking rent $1,892 (+4.8%). Charleston-North Charleston, SC metro.
to buy the typical home at today's mortgage rate — +$1,042 (+109%) since Jan 2020.
- 1 year
- Down $2,097 -1%
- $382,068$379,971 since Sep 2025
- 5 years
- Up $62,044 +20%
- $317,928$379,971 since Sep 2021
Monthly payment to buy the typical home
Home value × that month's 30-year mortgage rate, 20% down, principal and interest. This is the line households feel: prices and rates compound each other.
- Summerville$1,994
- South Carolina$1,597
- United States$1,922
At the last five years' pace, a typical home here doubles in price every 19 years.
Typical home values in Summerville, SC fell 0.5% over the past year — slower than the nation's +1.2%.
Asking rents in Summerville, SC rose 4.8% over the past year — faster than the nation's +2.7%.
Owning the typical home in Summerville runs $687/mo more than renting one. The gap peaked at $896 in Oct 2023.
That is $2,579 a month against $1,892 rent: a $1,994 mortgage payment, plus $178 property tax and $407 insurance & upkeep.
Owning vs renting — Summerville
The owning line is the typical home's monthly payment at that month's rate, plus property tax and insurance & upkeep; the renting line is the typical asking rent; the grey line is the mortgage payment on its own. Same homes, same months, both ways of paying for a roof.
- Owning all in$2,579
- Renting$1,892
- Mortgage only$1,994
Property tax · $178/mo 0.56% of value a year — the ACS 2020-2024 median bill over the median home value for Dorchester County, SC
Insurance & upkeep · $407/mo insurance, maintenance and repairs together, from the BLS Consumer Expenditure Survey — the national figure for mortgaged homeowners, scaled to this market's home value. BLS publishes the three bundled and they cannot be split.
Both are priced off the same month's home value, so they rise with the market. Neither is a quote — a specific home's bill depends on its assessment, its age and its insurer.
Living in Summerville, Dorchester County, South Carolina
Summerville is a town of 50,915 people in Dorchester County. Half its households earn more than $81,046 a year and half less, against $78,198 across Dorchester County; 10% of its people live below the poverty line. 69% of its homes are lived in by their owners and 31% are rented. Unemployment in Summerville was 3.8% in August 2026, and Dorchester County had 0.9% more jobs in 2025 than the year before. The most residents work in schools and health care, then shops.
Written by AI Claude Sonnet 5.5 wrote this on 23 October 2026 from the figures here, a list of nearby places and what it knows. It can be wrong or out of date.
What it’s like
The place. Summerville is a sizeable town where most homes are lived in by their owners, and household incomes run a little above the county's. Typical home values and rents are both fairly high. The population is of middle age, and a good share of adults hold a four-year degree. Winters are mild, with January the coldest month, while July brings hot days, and rain is plentiful through the year.
Work. Many residents work in schools, hospitals and social care, in shops, in professional and business services, or in manufacturing. Among the largest workplaces in Summerville are Dorchester 02 Schools, HCA Healthcare Summerville Hospital and Walmart. The commute is fairly long for many people, and unemployment has eased slightly compared with a year earlier.
Things to do. Close to home, the Old White Meeting House Ruins and Cemetery is an archaeological site in or beside town. A longer drive brings you to Fort Sumter, a fort of great historical interest, and to the H. L. Hunley, a museum devoted to the Civil War submarine. Magnolia Plantation and Gardens, a botanical garden in Charleston, is also a longer drive away.
Report a mistake
- 21,228households
- 34%of adults have a degree
- 10%below the poverty line
- 31 mintypical commute
- 11%work from home
What residents work in
Employed residents by industry, from the Census survey. Dorchester County had 41,814 jobs in 2025, 0.9% more than the year before (Bureau of Labor Statistics).
Weather through the year
Coldest in January, with highs near 58° and lows near 34°; warmest in July, with highs near 90° and lows near 71°. About 53 inches of rain and melted snow a year.
Average daily high and low, 1991–2020, at the Summerville 4W weather station, 4 miles away (NOAA).
Largest workplaces in Summerville
- Dorchester 02 SchoolsSchool district3,644FTE
- HCA Healthcare Summerville HospitalGeneral medical and surgical hospitals668
- WalmartWarehouse clubs and supercenters443
- TargetDiscount department stores282
- Presbyterian Communities of South CarolinaContinuing care retirement communities281
- Publix Super MarketsSupermarkets and other grocery stores210
- Lowe's Companies, INCHomecenter209
- Henry J. Lee Distributors162
Staff on average in 2025, as each workplace reported it to OSHA with its injury records: 33 workplaces with 20 or more staff, 3,740 people in all. School districts come from the Common Core of Data (NCES, 2023–24); FTE marks full-time equivalent staff. Not listed: many offices and banks, which need not report to OSHA; military bases, whose staff OPM withholds; and, in about half the states, city and county governments.
Natural hazards
- HurricanesVery high
- EarthquakesVery high
- LightningRelatively high
- Ice stormsrelatively high in parts of SummervilleRelatively moderate
- Tornadoesrelatively high in parts of SummervilleRelatively moderate
- Winter weatherRelatively moderate
FEMA’s National Risk Index (December 2025) rates the risk each natural hazard poses to the people, buildings and farms in Summerville’s census tracts, against the rest of the country; all of them together, very high. It is meant for planning, not a substitute for a local risk assessment or a flood map: FEMA’s index.
From the U.S. Census Bureau’s 2020 census and its American Community Survey (2020–2024 five-year estimates), and the Bureau of Labor Statistics. A survey, so each figure has a margin of error, and figures it is not sure of are left out. More on Dorchester County and the Charleston-North Charleston, SC metro.
Summerville home values
Zillow measures a city over its municipal boundary. Against the state and national figures, mid-tier homes, smoothed and seasonally adjusted.
- Summerville$379,971
- South Carolina$304,319
- United States$366,157
Levy by levy, and a check of one home’s own bill, the site covers Ohio’s property tax.
Sellers are cutting prices on about 1 in 3 Summerville listings, and the typical home goes pending in 58 days — the market is cooling.
When this market ran hot
Each cell is that month's year-on-year home-value growth. Read left to right, top row is the latest year — the 2021–22 band is the boom.
Market heat, inside the city limits
Share of listings with a price cut
The early-warning dial: sellers cut when buyers stop reaching. Rising cuts cool a market months before prices notice.
- Summerville31.49%
- United States26.90%
Days to pending
How long the typical listing takes to go under contract.
- Summerville58
- United States27
Homes for sale
Active for-sale inventory. More supply hands power to buyers.
- Summerville1,566
New listings per month
Sellers arriving at the market.
- Summerville282
Median sale price
What buyers actually paid — closed sales, not asking prices.
- Summerville$382,050
- United States$371,407
Sale-to-list ratio
Above 100%, homes sell over asking; below, buyers negotiate wins.
- Summerville98.14%
Zip codes with a Summerville address
A different geography, not a breakdown. The figure above covers the municipality; these zips cover everywhere the Post Office calls Summerville — often including townships beyond the city limits. Both come straight from Zillow, and they are not expected to average out.
Zip codes in Summerville
| Zip activate to sort by Zip | Place activate to sort by Place | Population sorted descending, activate to sort ascending | Rent activate to sort by Rent | Home value activate to sort by Home value |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 29483 | Summerville | 59,186 | $1,906 | $361,819 |
| 29485 | Summerville | 58,507 | $1,733 | $370,303 |
| 29486 | Summerville | 53,975 | $1,935 | $409,517 |