“Don’t sell for under 1 billion won... push prices up 50 million with complaint barrages”: Homeowners caught fixing prices in group chat

[Financial News] An investigation by Gyeonggi Province has found that residents of several apartment complexes in the province colluded to fix home prices through an online open group chat, and collectively harassed real estate agents who refused to cooperate.

On the 12th, Gyeonggi Province’s Real Estate Investigation Task Force announced that, through an intensive probe launched in December last year, it had uncovered organized price-fixing schemes in the areas of Hanam, Seongnam and Yongin.
One of the uncovered cases involved an apartment complex in Hanam, where residents used a KakaoTalk open group chat to coordinate price-fixing. A total of 179 residents joined the chat under anonymous nicknames and set a guideline of "no sales below 1 billion won," then colluded to keep prices at that level.
They labeled agencies that listed properties below a certain price as "offices dealing in fake listings" and systematically disrupted their business by coordinating mass complaints to local authorities. When nearby agents advertised properties for less than 1 billion won, residents bombarded them with protest calls, reported legitimate listings as fake on portal sites, and filed collective complaints with Hanam City Hall.
According to chat logs obtained by investigators, participants urged one another on, saying, "Let’s use a barrage of complaints in February and March to push prices up by more than 50 million won," and, "Let’s treat filing complaints and making calls and texts as our routine for a while. Think of it like your company job."

Four real estate offices that suffered damage reported that they "had no choice but to take down advertisements for lower-priced homes because of nonstop protest calls and false reports." A public official in charge of real estate management at Hanam City Hall also testified that "dozens of complaints with identical content were filed in relay fashion, to the point that normal administrative work was nearly paralyzed."
In particular, the resident identified as A, who created the open chat room and led the collusion, was found to have bought his own home in 2023 for 787 million won and later sold it for 1.08 billion won, pocketing about 300 million won in profit.
Similar cases were uncovered in Seongnam and Yongin. In Seongnam, residents drew up a blacklist and took turns visiting real estate offices, posing as customers to disrupt business and pressure agents. In Yongin, by contrast, real estate agents formed a private social club and refused to co-broker deals with non-members, engaging in exclusionary practices that undermined fair competition.
Based on the evidence secured, the province plans to refer four key suspects to prosecutors by the end of this month.
bng@fnnews.com Kim Hee-sun Reporter