“They Say They’ll Build Homes, Yet Block Loans” — Will the Land Committee’s National Assembly Audit Zero In on Housing Hardships Facing Ordinary People and Young Adults?

[Financial News] With the consistency of real estate policy expected to come under scrutiny ahead of the National Assembly audit on the 6th of next month, the National Assembly Research Service (NARS) has identified the conflict between housing supply measures and lending regulations, instability in the jeonse and monthly rental markets, and measures against jeonse fraud as key issues, drawing attention.
The key issues likely to face the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport (MOLIT) during this year’s audit include the consistency of expanding supply while tightening lending, the time lag between the medium- to long-term solution of public housing supply and the immediate shortage of jeonse and monthly rental listings, and the lack of fundamental measures to address recurring jeonse fraud affecting young people.
In its report, “2026 National Assembly Audit Issue Analysis: This Year’s Questions the Government Must Answer,” published on the 27th of last month, the National Assembly Research Service asked MOLIT, “You say you will build homes where there is demand, yet you are creating a structure that blocks people from buying homes in the very same places,” and “What is the top priority of current housing policy?” The questions pointed to the conflict between policies to expand housing supply and lending regulations.

Since June 2025, the government has simultaneously pushed for a large-scale expansion of housing supply and stringent lending regulations. Under the June 27 lending measures, it capped mortgage loans in the Capital Metropolitan Area and regulated areas at 600 million won and completely banned loans for multiple-home owners. Under the September 7 measures, it announced a total of 1.35 million homes, or 270,000 annually, to be supplied in Seoul and the Capital Metropolitan Area from 2026 to 2030, based on construction starts.
The October 15 measures then introduced “triple regulations” by simultaneously designating apartment, row-house, and multiplex housing complexes in regulated areas as adjustment target areas, overheated speculation zones, and land transaction permit zones. They also raised the stress interest rate used to calculate the debt service ratio from 1.5% to 3.0%.
The problem is that the areas targeted for expanded supply largely overlap with those subject to lending restrictions. NARS pointed out, “While the government says it will expand housing supply in Seoul, the Capital Metropolitan Area, and key central-city locations, it is simultaneously tightening mortgage lending regulations, designating regulated areas, and expanding land transaction permit zones, particularly in those very areas.”
NARS also highlighted the time lag: supply reaches the market only after several years, while lending regulations take effect immediately after being announced. It asked, “If actual demanders are supposed to be the beneficiaries of the policy, why regulate the financial channel that affects them first?”

The rental-market crisis was also identified as an unavoidable issue. According to NARS, monthly rental transactions, including monthly rentals with deposits and half-jeonse arrangements, accounted for 68.6% of all transactions on a cumulative basis through May 2026, up 7.6 percentage points from the same period a year earlier. Over the past five years, the figure has risen every year, from 51.9% in 2022 to 55.5% in 2023, 57.8% in 2024, 61.0% in 2025, and 68.6% in 2026.
The shift toward monthly rentals is even more severe for non-apartment housing, reaching 80.9% nationwide in 2026. The result reflects a combination of factors, including tighter jeonse loan regulations following the fallout from jeonse fraud, tenants’ preference for safety amid fears that deposits will not be returned, and landlords’ preference for cash flow amid stronger capital-gains taxes on multiple-home owners. However, since 2025, the government has maintained that it will ease rental-market instability through housing supply, public rentals, and support for young people, without introducing a separate comprehensive jeonse and monthly rental policy.
NARS responded, “The government speaks of expanding public rentals and public housing as if they were the key solutions to stabilizing the jeonse and monthly rental market, but what is needed now is an increase in listings that people can feel in the Capital Metropolitan Area market within the next six months to one year,” adding that the policy has “major shortcomings in terms of timing and effectiveness.”
It also noted, “The government is pursuing an expansion of public rental housing to support low-income and vulnerable groups, but the problems emerging in the actual jeonse and monthly rental market in the Capital Metropolitan Area are ‘a sharp decline in market listings’ and ‘soaring prices.’” The criticism is that the government is approaching the rental issue only as an extension of welfare policy, rather than viewing it as a supply crisis within the housing market itself.


As of the end of June 2026, 39,669 cases had been recognized and provided support under the Special Act on Support for Jeonse Fraud Victims and Housing Stability. The problem is that 30,128 victims under the age of 40 accounted for 75.95% of the total.
Of the 20,048 increase in total victims from July 2024 through June 2026, 78.21%, or 15,680 cases, involved people under 40. There were 10,086 victims in their 20s, defined as ages 20 to 29, and 20,038 in their 30s, defined as ages 30 to 39. Combined, victims in their 20s and 30s numbered 30,124.
NARS pointed out that “jeonse fraud continues to be concentrated among young people” and said it should be treated not as an ordinary rental-transaction problem but as a structural crisis in youth housing stability. It particularly called for specific quantitative targets covering the share of young victims, the number of new victims, the number of high-risk contracts blocked, and the rate of deposit recovery, noting that government measures have not been redesigned to target young people even though about 78% of the increase in victims occurred among them.
[email protected] Kim Hee-sun Reporter