"Claim: Summing Floor Areas Should Qualify for Two Houses"
Law: "Not Eligible for Two-House Allocation... Association's Judgment Is Justified"
A union member owning two unauthorized buildings in the redevelopment area of Hannam-dong, Seoul, filed a lawsuit demanding "two apartments" but lost and was awarded only one.
The Administrative Division 2 of the Seoul Administrative Court (Presiding Judge Ko Eun-seol) dismissed Mr. A's lawsuit filed against a housing redevelopment association in a redevelopment promotion zone in Seoul, seeking to invalidate the general meeting resolution on the management disposition plan, according to Yonhap News on the 16th.
Mr. A owns two unauthorized buildings in Hannam-dong, Yongsan-gu, Seoul. When the association started the housing redevelopment project in 2021, he applied to be allocated two apartments. Mr. A claimed that the combined floor area of each floor of his unauthorized buildings qualified him to receive two apartments. However, in July 2022, the association established and approved a management disposition plan stating, "Mr. A, as the owner of unauthorized buildings, cannot have his residential exclusive area verified and is therefore excluded from the two-household supply target," allowing allocation for only one 84㎡ apartment. Unable to accept this, Mr. A filed a lawsuit against the association, asserting that he qualified as a two-household allocation target.
However, the court ruled that the general meeting resolution of the housing redevelopment association, which found it difficult to recognize the residential exclusive area of unauthorized buildings as is during redevelopment projects, was legitimate. The court stated, "There is insufficient basis to consider the property tax ledger and survey results as the standard for calculating the 'residential exclusive area' for unauthorized buildings without building management registers, which are necessary for estimating the value of existing buildings." Furthermore, the court explained, "In redevelopment projects involving multiple stakeholders, it is necessary to uniformly handle rights based on objective and clear standards disclosed externally," adding, "Only the parts confirmed by official documents such as building registers and certified copies of the register should be included within the scope of the residential exclusive area of the existing housing."
Additionally, the court noted, "The Seoul City Urban Maintenance Ordinance includes an exceptional provision to include owners of certain unauthorized buildings, as defined by the association's articles of incorporation, who are using them for residential purposes as allocation targets to protect the housing rights of unauthorized building owners who may lose their homes due to redevelopment projects," and ruled that "this provision should not be expanded to cases unrelated to this purpose," dismissing Mr. A's claim.
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