Ministry of Land, Agriculture, and Oceans Establish 'Vacant House Survey Guidelines'

The Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport announced on the 8th that, together with the Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs and the Ministry of Oceans and Fisheries, it has prepared the 'National Vacant House Survey Integrated Guidelines' and will distribute them to local governments nationwide.

Until now, the vacant house system faced difficulties in local governments' vacant house surveys and maintenance plan establishment due to differences in causes of vacant houses and maintenance directions between urban and rural fishing villages. Additionally, there were discrepancies with the number of vacant houses determined by the Population and Housing Census conducted by Statistics Korea, causing confusion. In urban and rural fishing villages, houses that have been unoccupied or unused for more than one year, excluding unsold houses, are classified as vacant houses. However, the Statistics Korea survey included temporarily vacant houses such as newly built, sold, or unsold houses that were unoccupied at the time of the survey.

Accordingly, the three ministries jointly conducted a 'Study on Institutional Improvement for Vacant House Management System Reform,' unified the criteria and evaluation items for vacant houses, and established a nationwide vacant house monitoring system to lay the foundation for accurate identification of vacant house status for systematic maintenance.

The three ministries plan to integrate and build a vacant house information system by June that provides information on vacant houses identified through the vacant house survey (classified into three grades: utilization, management, and maintenance), offering customized information such as nationwide vacant house status and statistics by city and county.

The Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport plans to systematically grasp the status of vacant houses in each local government and closely cooperate with related organizations to ensure efficient management of vacant houses.