[Asia Economy Reporter Lee Chun-hee] While the government continues to enforce strong real estate regulations on its citizens, it has been revealed that no related statistics have been established regarding speculative real estate purchases by foreigners.
On the 19th, Kim Hoe-jae, a member of the National Assembly's Land, Infrastructure and Transport Committee from the Democratic Party of Korea, stated during a government audit of the Korea Real Estate Board, "Measures to regulate speculative housing purchases by foreigners need to be prepared, but there are no statistics on the status of foreign housing ownership, which serve as basic data, anywhere."
According to the National Tax Service, from 2017 to last May, foreigners purchased 23,167 apartments domestically, amounting to 7.6726 trillion won. The number of purchases has been gradually increasing from 5,308 cases in 2017 to 6,974 in 2018, and 7,371 last year.
In particular, despite the spread of COVID-19 this year, 3,515 cases were purchased by last May, marking a 27% increase compared to the same period last year. In August, it was also revealed that an American in his 40s made 42 gap investments.
Regarding this, Assemblyman Kim Hoe-jae pointed out, "Due to the lack of foreign housing ownership data, such information can only be identified based on taxes paid during transactions. In January 2017, the 'Foreigners' Land Act' was integrated and revised into the 'Real Estate Transaction Reporting Act,' which provided grounds to manage building ownership data, but statistics have still not been established."
He continued, "Housing ownership statistics are essential as basic data to understand how foreign housing ownership affects our real estate market and how to regulate and manage foreign housing transactions. The Korea Real Estate Board should promptly establish statistics on the status of foreign housing ownership in consultation with the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport," he urged.
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