Apartment Brokerage Fee for 900 Million Won Reduced from '8.1 Million → 4.5 Million Won'...Revised Plan to be Implemented Next Month

Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport Announces Legislative Notice for Amendment to Enforcement Rules of the Licensed Real Estate Agent Act

On the 17th, ahead of the real estate brokerage commission reform, property listings are posted at a real estate agency in Songpa-gu, Seoul. Photo by Mun Ho-nam munonam@

Starting next month, the upper limit rates for brokerage fees charged by real estate agents will be reduced for transactions over 600 million KRW for sales and over 300 million KRW for leases.

The Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport announced on the 2nd that it will publicly notify the amendment to the Enforcement Rules of the Real Estate Agents Act, which includes these changes, until the 16th. After a two-week period for collecting opinions, the amendment is expected to be implemented in early next month.

This public notice reflects the 'Real Estate Brokerage Fees and Brokerage Service Improvement Plan' announced by the Ministry last month on the 20th.

The current enforcement rules stipulate that brokerage fees should be set by local ordinances within the upper limit rates (0.9% for sales and exchanges, 0.8% for leases, etc.). The amendment sets the upper limit rates by transaction amount in the enforcement rules and allows local ordinances to set fees within that range.

However, considering regional characteristics, local ordinances may adjust the upper limit rates by adding or subtracting 0.1% (one-thousandth) of the transaction amount.

The amendment applies for the first time when contracts such as sales, exchanges, or leases are concluded between brokerage clients.

For matters delegated to local government ordinances, if there are existing ordinances, they will continue to apply until those ordinances are amended, provided they do not conflict with the Enforcement Rules of the Real Estate Agents Act.

For sales, transactions under 600 million KRW will maintain the current upper limit rates (hereafter referred to as rates), but the rates will change starting from the 600 million KRW threshold. The rate for the 600 million to 900 million KRW range will decrease by 0.1 percentage points from 0.5% to 0.4%.

Currently, a 0.9% rate applies for transactions over 900 million KRW, but going forward, rates will be 0.5% for 900 million to 1.2 billion KRW, 0.6% for 1.2 billion to 1.5 billion KRW, and 0.7% for transactions over 1.5 billion KRW. In this case, the maximum brokerage fee for a 900 million KRW house sale will decrease from 8.1 million KRW to 4.5 million KRW.

For lease contracts, the fee rate will be reduced for transactions over 300 million KRW. Applying the new rates, the maximum brokerage fee for a 600 million KRW jeonse (long-term deposit lease) transaction will decrease from 4.8 million KRW to 2.4 million KRW, and for a 900 million KRW jeonse transaction, it will decrease from 7.2 million KRW to 3.6 million KRW.

Han Jeong-hee, Director of the Real Estate Industry Division at the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport, said, "After collecting opinions on the amendment to the Enforcement Rules of the Real Estate Agents Act and undergoing review by the Ministry of Government Legislation, the amendment is expected to be implemented as early as October. We expect this to reduce the brokerage fee burden on the public caused by rising housing prices."

The Ministry also announced on the 3rd that it will promptly amend the Enforcement Decree and Enforcement Rules of the Real Estate Agents Act to increase the guaranteed amount for liability insurance and to specify the rights and responsibilities related to confirming and explaining brokerage objects in multi-family housing brokerage accidents.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.