Villa Jeonse Avoidance Deepens... This Year, 6 out of 10 Non-Apartment Rentals in Seoul Are 'Monthly Rent'

From January to July this year, the proportion of monthly rent transactions in Seoul's housing rental market excluding apartments reached an all-time high. The avoidance of jeonse (long-term deposit lease) due to jeonse fraud and reverse jeonse difficulties shows little sign of easing.

A property listing posted at a real estate agency in Seoul. / Photo by Hyunmin Kim kimhyun81@

On the 23rd, Economic Man Lab, a real estate information provider, analyzed data from the Seoul Real Estate Information Plaza and found that the total number of jeonse and monthly rent transactions for non-apartment housing (detached houses, multi-family houses, and row houses) in Seoul from January to July this year was 162,192. Among these, monthly rent transactions accounted for 97,801, and jeonse transactions were 64,391, making the monthly rent proportion 60.3%. The volume of non-apartment jeonse transactions was the second lowest since 2016 (63,385 transactions).

This is the first time since the Seoul Real Estate Information Plaza began compiling related statistics in 2011 (based on January to July) that the monthly rent proportion in Seoul's non-apartment rental market has exceeded 60%.

Among the 25 autonomous districts, Gwanak-gu was found to have the highest proportion of monthly rent for non-apartments. During this period, there were 14,691 jeonse and monthly rent transactions for non-apartment housing in Gwanak-gu, of which 4,480 (69.5%) were monthly rent, approaching 70%.

Other districts where the monthly rent proportion exceeded 60% include Nowon-gu (69.3%), Jongno-gu (66.7%), Dongdaemun-gu (66.3%), Dongjak-gu (66.2%), Seodaemun-gu (65.2%), Gangnam-gu (64.5%), Gwangjin-gu (63.1%), Seongbuk-gu (62.4%), Guro-gu (62.0%), Yeongdeungpo-gu (61.9%), Jung-gu (61.1%), and Songpa-gu (60.7%).

On the other hand, the monthly rent proportion for apartments in Seoul slightly decreased after reaching a record high last year. From January to July last year, the monthly rent proportion for Seoul apartments was 42.5%, but this year it dropped by 1 percentage point to 41.5% compared to the previous year.

Hwang Hansol, a research fellow at Economic Man Lab, said, "As the safety and reliability of jeonse decrease due to jeonse fraud, the proportion of monthly rent is increasing in the non-apartment market," adding, "There is also a possibility that jeonse demand for non-apartments in Seoul may shift to small apartments in the city or apartments in Gyeonggi-do."

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