Gyeonggi Province's proposal to lower the threshold for officetel use changes and restrict the approval of new residential lodging facilities was included in the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport's (MOLIT) "Support Measures for the Legal Use of Residential Lodging Facilities" announced on the 16th.
Residential lodging facilities refer to accommodations equipped with cooking facilities intended for long-term guests. The issue is that, unlike general lodging facilities, some are illegally used as residences without lodging business registration because cooking is allowed. This has led to social problems due to conflicts with local communities, such as parking shortages.
To prevent illegal lodging operations in residential lodging facilities, MOLIT temporarily relaxed some officetel construction standards from October 2021 to October 2023 for two years. However, difficulties in use changes arose due to failure to meet regulations such as corridor width and parking spaces.
In this situation, Gyeonggi Province introduced the nation's first "Preliminary Review System for Use Change of Residential Lodging Facilities" in July this year, which reviews and guides whether use changes are possible even if the resident consent requirement is not met for owners wishing to change the use of residential lodging facilities. It also proposed related matters such as easing use change standards to MOLIT.
The MOLIT measures allow use changes from existing residential lodging facilities to officetels if safety is verified by supplementing fire and evacuation facilities through fire performance-oriented design when corridor width is insufficient, subject to review by the architectural committee.
Additionally, for new residential lodging facilities, sales are required to be in units of 30 rooms or more, the lodging business registration standard, to prevent residential use and resolve the problem of the proliferation of residential lodging facilities caused by single-room sales.
Besides easing standards, MOLIT also included plans for local governments to establish "Residential Lodging Facility Support Centers" in areas with many unregistered residential lodging facilities nationwide and provide consulting to support use changes. This expands Gyeonggi Province's preliminary review system for use changes as a standard model nationwide.
Lee Gye-sam, Director of the Urban Housing Office of Gyeonggi Province, said, "We welcome the reflection of Gyeonggi Province's proposals in this measure and hope that residential lodging facilities can be operated legally through this."
© The Asia Business Daily(www.asiae.co.kr). All rights reserved.
