DSCR Loans in North Myrtle Beach, SC: The City's Rental License, a Permit Still Only Proposed and Beach Condos

In North Myrtle Beach, the trash truck comes to a vacation rental home on Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays as well as on its regular pickup day. The City added those pickups after complaints about garbage left at the curb, and for 2026 they ran from May 1 through October 16, according to the City's sanitation page.

In North Myrtle Beach, a DSCR loan qualifies an investment property on its monthly rent divided by its full monthly payment. Nightly rent counts only when the lender has a 12-month income statement and proof that the City allows short-term rental.

I'm Jeff Moran, NMLS #483943, a mortgage broker licensed in South Carolina through C2 Financial Corporation, and I have been in the mortgage business since 1996. I work from Bluffton, down the coast in Beaufort County. My North Myrtle Beach page covers the four beaches that became one city in 1968, my Myrtle Beach area page covers Horry County, and the DSCR article explains the ratio in general. This page is about financing an investment property inside the City limits. Every lender term below comes from Luxury Mortgage Corp., one of the wholesale lenders I work with. Other lenders set their own terms and these change, so please read this as one lender's method and not as a quote.

The City's rules for a rental property owner, and the lender's questions about them

The City's rules come first here, because they are the part of this loan that depends on the address. The City's short-term rental page says every short-term rental inside North Myrtle Beach has to have a business license and renew it each year, and that there is currently no special zoning or permit process beyond that standard licensing. The rental property has to follow the City's rules on trash, parking, noise and occupancy. The page records the rest of the history too. A moratorium proposal in 2018 failed, and a workshop in 2020 did not produce an ordinance. Council held workshops in November 2024 and January 2025, and more than 200 residents attended an information session in June 2025.

A permit is still a proposal as far as that page shows. When staff presented it in November 2024, WMBF reported it would mean an annual permit and a local responsible party for each rental property, someone who can respond quickly when guests cause a problem. The City counted about 5,400 short-term rentals and said about 1,700 of them had no local responsible party. I could not find a page that says council has decided it, so please ask the City which rules apply on the day you buy.

Luxury Mortgage's side of this is one line in the guidelines. For an investment property rented by the night, on a purchase, the file needs proof that short-term rental is allowed in the property's municipality, along with:

• proof that you have managed short-term rentals, and proof that the property is listed on a short-term rental site
• proof that the property is in a market that supports short-term rentals
• a 12-month income statement that you did not write yourself, from the prior owner if one is available

The lender calls a lease term under six months short-term. The rent it counts is the lesser of that 12-month statement or 90% of a third-party estimate such as AirDNA's Rentalizer or the Nationwide Appraisal Network's or Opteon's short-term rental products. The ratio has to reach 1.0, and the loan-to-value, which is the loan as a share of the home's value, has to be 5% below the lender's usual maximum. In North Myrtle Beach the City's license page is where I would start gathering the proof of what is allowed. Atlantic Beach and Briarcliffe Acres are separate towns on this same stretch of coast, and I have not read their rental rules, so a mailing address that says North Myrtle Beach is worth checking against the parcel's tax district first.

Rent against the full payment

DSCR stands for debt service coverage ratio. Luxury Mortgage's Simple Access guidelines, version 9.2, dated July 8, 2026 and revised July 31, 2026, divide the property's monthly rent by its full monthly payment, which the guidelines call PITIA: principal, interest, property taxes, insurance and association charges. At rent of $1,000 against a payment of $800, the ratio is 1.25.

The ratio has to reach 1.000, and it is calculated precisely, so 0.999 does not round up. The lender does not verify your income or employment on this loan and does not work out a debt-to-income ratio. The property is what qualifies the loan, so the rent and the payment both matter. The rent depends on how the home is rented, and the payment depends on a tax bill and condo dues that change from one block to the next.

An illustration of nightly rent against a long-term lease

These are round figures to show the arithmetic. They are not North Myrtle Beach rents or prices.

Illustration, same home, payment of $3,400 a month	Rent counted per month	DSCR
Nightly rental: 12-month statement of $44,000, and 90% of a $50,000 estimate is $45,000, so the lender takes the lesser, $44,000	$3,667	1.078
Same home on the appraiser's long-term market rent	$2,900	0.853

The first row clears the 1.0 minimum the lender sets for an investment property rented by the night. The second does not, and the lender has a separate set of conditions for a ratio under 1.0. Its own example, at 0.800, calls for a loan-to-value of 75% or lower, a credit score of 680 or higher and 6 more months of reserves (money left in your accounts after closing), and a ratio under 0.750 is not eligible. I work out which conditions apply on your file, because a home can land on either side of 1.0 depending on which rent the lender is allowed to use.

The 6% tax bill, and the City's five new mills

South Carolina's property tax law assesses a home you live in at 4% of its value, and only if it is not rented for more than 72 days in a calendar year. Other real property is assessed at 6%. An investment property in North Myrtle Beach is in the 6% group, and a mill is one dollar of tax for every $1,000 of assessed value.

Illustration: $569,716 purchase	Assessed value	Tax per mill
Home you live in, 4%	$22,789	$22.79
Investment property, 6%	$34,183	$34.18

The $569,716 is the year-to-date median single-family sales price through August 2026 for ZIP code 29582 in the Coastal Carolinas Association of REALTORS' September report. That ZIP area is not the same as the City limits, so it is a starting point and not a tax estimate. For fiscal year 2027, MyHorryNews reported, City Council raised its millage from 45 to 50 and raised water and sewer fees. Those five mills add about $171 a year at the 6% assessment on that median and about $114 at the 4% assessment. The county and the schools levy their own mills on the same bill. I price the whole bill on the sale price for your address, because the seller's bill may have been written at 4% if the seller lived there.

Condos and the towers

Condos are a large share of what sells in this ZIP area. Through August 2026 there were 598 townhouse and condo closings against 529 single-family closings, and the condo median was $310,000, in the same CCAR report. On a DSCR loan the lender then reviews the condo project:

• A project that meets Fannie Mae's or Freddie Mac's standards, called warrantable, is limited to 80% combined loan-to-value (counting any second mortgage too) on this loan.
• A project that misses one of those standards, with a single feature, can be financed at a lower limit. The note on the lender's rate and loan-to-value chart (its matrix) and its Section 9.1 put that limit at 70% on this loan. A project with more than one such feature is not acceptable.
• A master insurance policy with a deductible up to 10% is one of the features the lender may accept as a reason a project is non-warrantable.
• A condo in a project with hotel-like features is reviewed as a condo-hotel. The note on the lender's matrix limits it to 70% on this loan. It has to be in a resort area and meet the lender's hotel-brand rules, and timeshares and fractional ownership are not eligible.

Please ask early for the association's budget, its reserve study, the recent board minutes and any special assessments. A reserve study is the association's plan for saving up for big repairs like a roof. My North Myrtle Beach page notes that South Carolina has no statewide rule requiring a reserve study or a structural inspection for a condo building, so each association's own papers are the only picture you get. Whether a given tower rents by the night, by the week or only by the season is in those papers too, and the City's license does not answer it.

Association charges go into the payment. The lender's PITIA includes association fees and special assessments, which are one-time charges an association levies on owners.

Cherry Grove and the channel assessment

Dredging in Cherry Grove's canals is paid for through an improvement district that City Council created by ordinance in 2015, according to the City's 2024 assessment report. Council sets the assessment each year, and in 2024 WMBF reported it at $1,725 for a single-family home and $1,190 for a condo owner, down from around $2,400 when the district started. I have not confirmed the current year's amount, so the County's property record and the seller's closing papers are where to look. It is a yearly charge on the parcel, so on a Cherry Grove investment property I put it beside the tax bill when I work out what the home costs to carry. I also raise it with the lender on that file.

Flood and wind insurance in the payment

Flood insurance goes into the insurance part of the payment. The lender requires it on a home in a FEMA high-risk flood zone, which means Zone A or Zone V. It escrows the premium with your payment, meaning the lender holds part of each payment and pays the bill for you. Coverage has to be the lowest of the home's replacement cost, the National Flood Insurance Program maximum or the loan balance.

On wind, the lender will not accept a homeowner's policy that excludes windstorm or hurricane damage unless a separate policy or endorsement covers it, and that separate coverage can come from a state insurance pool. A condo project's master policy has to cover windstorm too. Hurricane Hazel came ashore at Ocean Drive in 1954 and my North Myrtle Beach page tells that story. Every premium you pay on an investment property is part of what the rent has to cover. I check the flood zone on each address. I have not printed how much of the city is in a high-risk flood zone, because I could not confirm a figure.

At 80% loan-to-value or lower, the lender allows the escrow account for taxes and homeowner's insurance to be waived, and flood premiums are escrowed at any loan-to-value. The lender's matrix tops out at 80% on a purchase.

The loan terms and the file

The lender treats this as a business purpose loan. Its own example is that a purchase of an investment property a family member will occupy is a consumer purpose loan (a loan for a property the owner or family will live in). Please tell me at the start if you plan to stay in the home yourself for part of the year, because that changes which loan fits.

The lender also looks at your own history with investment property. Unless the ratio is above 1.0, at least one person on the loan needs 12 months of owning and managing rental properties. A purchase can skip that with a 680 credit score, no late housing payments and no missed forbearance payment (a payment skipped under an agreement with the lender to pause payments) in the last 12 months, as long as you own the home you live in now. Everyone on the loan needs to own a primary residence or an investment property now, and an underwriter can waive that for someone who is not a first-time home buyer.

The lender accepts title in an LLC if at least one member qualifies and guarantees the loan and you and anyone else on the loan together own at least half of it.

The other terms for a purchase:

• The loan amount runs from $150,000 to $4,000,000.
• The matrix allows up to 80% loan-to-value at a ratio of 1.00 or higher. The largest loans are at lower loan-to-value.
• The minimum credit score is 620.
• Reserves, which are money left after closing, are 6 months of the full payment up to a $1,000,000 loan, 9 months above that up to $3,000,000 and 18 months above that up to $4,000,000. A ratio under 1.0 adds 6 months.
• A prepayment penalty is available on an investment property for terms of 1 to 5 years. It equals six months' interest on the amount you pay off in a year above 20% of the original balance.
• An interest-only payment can be used to calculate the ratio with a credit score of 680 and a loan-to-value of 80% or lower, and the taxes, insurance and association charges still count.
• A property of five to ten units follows separate rules, and short-term rent cannot be counted there.

Homework before you write an offer

These are things to look up on a specific address. Each one changes either the rent the lender can count or the payment it divides by.

1. The parcel's tax district on the Horry County property record: inside the City of North Myrtle Beach, or in Atlantic Beach or Briarcliffe Acres.
2. The City's business license for the home, and what the City says today about a permit or a local responsible party, since the proposal had not been decided on the pages I read.
3. The association's rules on renting, in writing, and whether it limits rentals by the night, the week or the season.
4. For a condo, the budget, reserve study, minutes, special assessments and the master insurance policy.
5. The Cherry Grove assessment on a Cherry Grove parcel, and the flood zone, a wind quote and a homeowner's insurance quote for any address.
6. The seller's rental history. Please provide the seller's 12-month rental income statement, all pages, even if the last page is intentionally left blank, along with the listing and the purchase contract, so I can see what rent the lender will count.

Talking it through with me

A DSCR loan is priced through my wholesale lender, outside the rate tool on this site, so the next step is a conversation with me. You are welcome to call me about a specific North Myrtle Beach property, or about one you are still deciding on, and there is no application or tool you need to go through first.

If you would like to see the same property financed as a second home or with a conventional loan, the second home versus investment property article covers that route. The article on counting nightly rent on a conventional loan covers the agency rules. Non-QM loans explains the family of programs this one belongs to, and my page on HELOCs in North Myrtle Beach is the place to start if you already own here.

Nothing on this page is a loan approval, a denial or a commitment to lend, and it is not tax or legal advice. The lender's guidelines are dated July 2026 and change, and your credit, the property, its rent history and the appraisal decide where a file lands under them.

Common questions

Does North Myrtle Beach require a permit to rent a home by the night?

The City's short-term rental page says every short-term rental in the City needs a business license, renewed each year, and that there is currently no special zoning or permit process beyond that licensing. A permit with a local responsible party for each rental property was proposed in November 2024, and I could not find a page showing council decided it, so please check with the City before you buy.

Can I use a DSCR loan to buy a short-term rental in North Myrtle Beach?

Yes, with conditions, under Luxury Mortgage's Simple Access guidelines. The file needs a 12-month income statement that you did not write yourself, proof that the property is listed on a short-term rental site, and proof that short-term rental is allowed in the municipality. The rent counted is the lesser of that statement or 90% of a third-party estimate, the ratio has to reach 1.0, and the maximum loan-to-value is 5% below the usual maximum.

Does a DSCR loan look at my income?

The lender does not verify your income or employment for this loan, and it does not work out a debt-to-income ratio. It qualifies the loan on the property's rent divided by its full monthly payment. It still looks at your credit score, your reserves, your history of owning rental properties and the property itself.

How much more is the property tax on a rental property than on a home I live in?

South Carolina assesses a home you live in at a lower share of its value than other real property, so an investment property's assessed value is one and a half times as high before the mills are applied. The section above works it through on the median sale price in the Coastal Carolinas Association of Realtors report. The lower share also ends if the home is rented more than 72 days in a calendar year.

Can I use a DSCR loan on a North Myrtle Beach condo?

Yes, if the project meets the lender's condo standards. A project that meets Fannie Mae's or Freddie Mac's standards is limited to 80% combined loan-to-value on this loan. A condo-hotel project has a lower limit, has to be in a resort area and meet the lender's hotel-brand rules, and timeshares and fractional ownership are not eligible.

Do flood and wind insurance count in the DSCR?

Yes. The payment the rent is divided by includes homeowner's insurance, flood insurance and association charges, so a higher flood or wind premium lowers the ratio. The lender requires flood insurance in a FEMA high-risk zone and wants any windstorm exclusion in a homeowner's policy covered by a separate policy or endorsement.