National Policy Committee to Focus on Housing Supply During Five Years of Lee Administration

Short-term Real Estate Policies to Be Addressed by Presidential Office, Ruling Party, and Government

Yonhap News

The National Policy Planning Committee, which serves as the transition team for the Lee Jaemyung administration, announced, "From a mid- to long-term perspective, we will focus on expanding housing supply over the next five years of this administration and on formulating national policy tasks related to housing welfare."

On the afternoon of the 25th, Lee Choonseok, head of the Economic Division 2 of the committee, stated during a briefing at the Changseong-dong annex of the Government Complex Seoul, "The committee does not address measures in response to short-term market situations, such as the recent surge in apartment prices in Seoul. We believe these are matters that require close coordination between the Presidential Office, the ruling party, and the government," he said.

He added, "Real estate issues are extremely sensitive and require a cautious approach. We determined that focusing solely on short-term measures could make it difficult to establish mid- to long-term plans at the national level."

During a Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport work report on the 20th, he had requested, "Do not propose measures such as building new towns around the Seoul metropolitan area simply to stabilize real estate prices." When asked whether this meant the government would not pursue the current third phase new town projects being implemented by the ministry, or whether it meant refraining from additional new town projects, he explained, "The construction of existing new towns is not a matter for us to intervene in; it will naturally proceed as planned."

He continued, "When there is a request for various real estate supply measures, the representative policy typically presented by a new administration is the new town policy. There are skeptical views about whether the new town policy can resolve real estate issues in the Seoul metropolitan area, and my comments were intended to express the need for a variety of housing supply measures from a personal perspective."