"Trust Fraud Homes Also to Be Rescued"... Government Makes First Purchase of Affected Properties

The Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport announced on September 2 that it has completed the purchase procedures for 16 homes affected by trust fraud.

Homes affected by trust fraud involved lease contracts (unauthorized contracts) signed with the trustor (the previous owner) who did not have legitimate leasing authority. As a result, these tenants were not eligible for legal protection under the Housing Lease Protection Act. In addition, it was difficult to enforce compulsory execution, such as court auctions.

Therefore, in order for public housing operators such as Korea Land and Housing Corporation (LH) to purchase homes affected by trust fraud, they had to negotiate individually with the trust companies holding ownership regarding price and contract terms. The homes purchased this time are multi-family units located in Buk-gu, Daegu.

The Ministry stated, "Since this is the first time that homes affected by trust fraud, which could not be purchased before the revision of the Lease Fraud Victims Act, have been acquired, we expect the purchase of lease fraud-affected homes to expand without any blind spots."

LH’s purchase of affected homes allows victims to convert the auction margin-gained by purchasing at a price lower than the normal market value-into a deposit, enabling them to live rent-free for up to 10 years. Upon moving out, the auction margin is paid to help recover any deposit losses. As of August 26, the total number of preliminary consultation requests for the purchase of affected homes from victims stands at 16,122. Among these, 9,217 cases have completed on-site inspections and purchase reviews. So far, a total of 1,924 homes have been acquired through consultations and auctions.

Meanwhile, the Lease Fraud Victim Support Committee held three full meetings last month, reviewing 2,008 cases and finally approving 950 cases as lease fraud victims or similar. Among the 950 approved cases, 857 were new applications, and 93 were cases where objections to previous decisions were accepted. To date, the committee has recognized a cumulative total of 33,135 lease fraud victims or similar, and has made 1,106 decisions to cooperate with urgent requests for suspension of court or public auctions.

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