133 Jeonse Fraud Victims Use Priority Purchase Rights for 'Self-Awarding of Damaged Housing'

It has been revealed that 133 victims of Jeonse fraud used their preemptive purchase rights to 'self-bid' on the victimized properties in public and private auctions. This was a desperate measure to recover at least some of their Jeonse deposits by taking over the victimized properties.

According to the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport on the 25th, since the enactment of the Special Act on Support for Jeonse Fraud Victims on June 1st, the Jeonse Fraud Victim Support Committee has recognized 12,928 people as victims over the past nine months. Among them, 133 received preemptive purchase rights and successfully bid on the victimized properties.

The most utilized government support measure by victims was refinancing existing Jeonse loans at low interest rates. A total of 1,032 people refinanced 150.4 billion KRW.

Support measures that deferred credit information registration to prevent victims from becoming credit delinquents and allowed installment repayment of existing Jeonse loans were used by 625 people (62.3 billion KRW). Emergency living expense support was provided in 1,376 cases (930 million KRW).

Legal and financial supports such as auction agency services (745 cases) and auction postponements (787 cases) were widely used by victims, but support for rental housing was relatively low.

There were 44 cases where nearby public rental housing was provided to victims, and 204 cases of emergency housing support.

While Jeonse fraud victims are demanding a relaxation of the victim recognition criteria, 80.8% of the applications submitted so far have been approved, and 9.4% (1,497 people) were rejected and thus not recognized as victims.

Among those not recognized as victims, half failed to meet the fourth victim criterion under the Special Act, which is the 'intent not to return the deposit.' This requires that there be reasonable suspicion that an investigation into the landlord has been initiated or that the landlord purchased multiple properties without the ability to return deposits and rented them out with the intent to avoid deposit return obligations.

The remaining approximately 46% failed to meet both the criteria of multiple victims and intent not to return the deposit simultaneously. Under the Special Act, 'multiple' means two or more people. This means that if only one victim occurs, it is not recognized as Jeonse fraud victimization.

Victims who had subscribed to Jeonse deposit return guarantee insurance, received priority repayment to recover the full deposit, or were able to recover their deposits independently through auctions?totaling 1,095 people (6.8%)?were excluded from victim review.

Among the recognized victims, 73% were in their 20s and 30s. Those in their 30s accounted for the largest share at 48%, followed by those in their 20s (25.5%) and 40s (15.2%). Victims with rental deposits of 100 million KRW or less accounted for 43.9% of the total. Those with deposits exceeding 100 million KRW up to 200 million KRW were 37.0%, and those with deposits exceeding 200 million KRW up to 300 million KRW were 17.0%. There were two victims with deposits exceeding 500 million KRW.

Victims were concentrated 63.7% in the metropolitan area, including Seoul (25.8%), Incheon (22.2%), and Gyeonggi Province (16.7%), followed by Daejeon (12.1%) and Busan (10.9%).

Victims of multi-family housing were the largest group at 33.9% (4,372 people), followed by officetels at 22.7% (2,926 people), apartments and row houses at 16.9% (2,192 people), and multi-unit houses at 16.0% (2,070 people).

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