This looks pretty good to me.
You should use safe navigation operator,
<mat-hint align="end">
{{field_description?.value?.length}} / 50 Chars please.
</mat-hint>
How are you defining the description
field in your component class?
If you are not setting a default value, it is undefined when the form first appears so you see that error.
As soon as you start to type, it is no longer undefined and it works as you expected.
So you can either set a default value (such as an empty string) or you can use the safe navigation operator as others here have suggested.