Chesterfield County, VA Business Licensing & Operations: Secondhand Dealers (2026)

Section 15-131 defines a covered "dealer" as anyone in the business of buying precious metals or gems, or lending against them as collateral, excluding retail merchants restocking from wholesalers and refiners buying from other dealers. Section 15-132 flatly bars purchases or pawn loans on precious metals or gems without a chief-of-police permit, and a permit from another locality does not substitute. Section 15-133 sets the permit fee at $200, renewable annually at the same rate, and conditions issuance on a Virginia State Police fingerprint background check, a clean record for the prior ten years of felonies or crimes of moral turpitude, and inspection of the dealer's weighing devices by state or local weights-and-measures officials.

Section 15-136 requires dealers to record each seller's or borrower's name, address, phone numbers, physical description and date of birth, verified against two forms of ID including one government photo ID, plus a digital image of that ID. the next workday for weekend transactions), and one given to the seller; police can enter during business hours to inspect records and search for stolen items. Section 15-138 bars purchases from anyone under 18 or from anyone the dealer believes isn't the true owner, absent written authorization.

Section 15-139 requires the dealer to hold every item, unsold and unaltered, for 15 calendar days after filing the bill of sale, and to keep records of who it was later sold to for 24 months after that hold period ends.