[Asia Economy Reporter Kim Hyung-min] The CEO of a real estate consulting firm, identified as the mastermind behind the "Villa King" who purchased hundreds of villas and committed jeonse fraud, has been brought to trial.
According to the legal community on the 5th, the Criminal Division 8 of the Seoul Central District Prosecutors' Office (Chief Prosecutor Kim Hyung-seok) indicted Shin Mo (39) on fraud charges on the 2nd.
Shin was identified as the mastermind behind several "Villa Kings," including Jeong Mo, who suddenly died in Jeju in July 2021, after buying and leasing about 240 villas and officetels in the Gangseo and Yangcheon districts of Seoul. From July 2017 to September 2020, he is accused of using multiple so-called "Villa Kings," who lent their names to his company as nominal landlords, to purchase multi-family houses through a no-capital gap speculation method and embezzle jeonse deposits. No-capital gap speculation is an investment method where lease and sales contracts are signed simultaneously, and the purchase price of newly built villas is paid using the tenant's jeonse deposit without the investor's own capital, essentially a "rolling" scheme.
It was investigated that Shin deceived 37 tenants in the Seoul Gangseo district and the metropolitan area including Incheon, embezzling about 8 billion KRW in deposits using this method.
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