빌라 사라지자, 서울이 나뉘고 있다 [서울]

[Anchor Commentary] Villas are disappearing from Seoul. Supply has decreased by 86% in seven years. In the void left by this, young people have been pushed into goshiwons (small, inexpensive rooms for rent), and the middle class has moved out of Seoul. Apartment Jeonse crisis and supply shortages. Reporter Yang Jin-oh covered the story that familiar diagnoses have missed. [Reporter] The year 2022 marked a dramatic shift in the proportion of Jeonse versus monthly rent. In the very year that a large-scale Jeonse fraud scandal broke out, the proportion of monthly rent in Seoul jumped by nearly 8 percentage points in an instant. Changes in Seoul's housing structure had already begun before the recent government policy was implemented. Amidst the changes that began four years ago, the choices of Seoul citizens diverged. Young people moved down a step from studio apartments to goshiwons. The middle class was pushed out of Seoul, to the outskirts of Gyeonggi Province. And those who remained—the wealthy—held their ground and saw their assets grow. In the same year and within the same city, the separation of Seoul is accelerating. This separation began when the supply of villas, rather than apartments, collapsed. Aversion to villas spread following the Jeonse fraud scandal, compounded by skyrocketing construction costs. Building new villas or studio apartments was no longer profitable. [Choi Hae-soo | Rental Business Owner] "Almost all of our companies have gone out of business. I bought land, but I can't work on it. It's because of material costs, and sales aren't going well either." An 86% decrease in seven years based on completion figures. Even in 2021, just before the large-scale Jeonse fraud, about 25,000 units were built, but last year, that number plummeted to around 4,800 units. This is only one-tenth the volume of completed apartments. [Woo Seong-jeong | Licensed Real Estate Agent] "Since the decrease in supply isn't clearly visible, not only is there not enough land for new construction, but the reality is that we don't see any actual renovations or expansions of existing buildings." Although supply has drastically decreased, the people who actually need to live in them haven't disappeared along with it. Consequently, the prices of villas and studio apartments, which had become targets of avoidance due to Jeonse scams, began to rise again. Furthermore, skyrocketing Jeonse prices for apartments pushed rental demand back to villas, fueling the price increase. As of March this year, the average monthly rent for studio apartments in Seoul exceeded 850,000 won. [Kim Young-sam | Licensed Real Estate Agent] "The supply of new construction has decreased particularly significantly. So, for clean buildings that are about 5 to 10 years old, the price has risen by an additional 100,000 to 200,000 won." As a result, the number of people holding out in villas has also started to increase. From January to April of this year, the proportion of lease renewal requests in Seoul villa rental transactions reached 32%, a 7.2 percentage point increase compared to the same period last year. Those who could not endure even these conditions and were evicted eventually found themselves in goshiwons. The lowest rung of the housing ladder has dropped one more notch. [Lee Jae-hong | Student Council President, Sungkyunkwan University] "Because the cost itself is high, there are many students who want to enter dormitories as an alternative. And when circumstances were truly difficult—such as failing to get into a dormitory or being unable to find a satisfactory place to live—there were quite a few cases where people ended up in goshiwons." In fact, the percentage of young people nationwide failing to meet minimum housing standards rose from 6.1% in 2023 to 8.2% in 2024, an increase of over 2 percentage points in just one year. This is more than double the average for all households. This shock did not stop with the youth. As villas disappeared, pressure also fell on the apartment Jeonse market. The apartment Jeonse price index plummeted in the second half of 2022 due to the shock of Jeonse fraud, but as the aversion to Jeonse itself subsided, it began to rise again from mid-2023 and has continued to rise to this day. Even though high interest rates of 3.5% have persisted for over 21 months, this trend shows no signs of reversing. The force of the supply cliff was greater than the pressure from interest rates. [Cha Il-cheol | Rental Business Owner] "Just because regulations are lifted and supply increases doesn't mean the market immediately feels the impact. It takes time, so I'm not sure. The market might improve again once that happens, but for now, we have to view it as a bit difficult." Ultimately, the number of tenants who switched to monthly rent, unable to afford Jeonse deposits, increased. In March of this year, more than 7 out of 10 lease contracts in Seoul were for monthly r...