Household Home Ownership Falls Below ‘200,000’… Home Ownership Rate at Record Low of 25.8%
8 out of 10 Young Single-Person Households Say “Owning a Home is Necessary”
(Sejong = Yonhap News) Reporter Song Jeong-eun = Last year, the number of households in their 30s living in Seoul that did not own homes was the highest since related statistics began to be compiled.
At the same time, only one out of four heads of households in their 30s owned a home, marking a record low home ownership rate.
Due to delayed marriages, an increase in single-person households, skyrocketing house prices in Seoul, a lack of supply, and strengthened loan regulations, it seems difficult for early-career individuals to buy their first homes.
According to the Housing Ownership Statistics and the National Statistics Portal by the National Data Agency, the number of households in their 30s (by head of household) living in Seoul without owning homes was counted at 527,729 last year.
This represents an increase of 17,215 households compared to the previous year, marking the highest number since statistics have been compiled in 2015.
The number of non-home-owning households in their 30s in Seoul decreased from 475,606 in 2015 to 456,461 in 2018, but has increased for six consecutive years since then.
The increase in non-home-owning households grew from 3,000 in 2021 to 15,000 in 2022, and to 17,000 last year and in 2023, with last year’s increase being the largest on record.
In contrast, the number of homeowners in their 30s in Seoul has been decreasing for three consecutive years.
Last year, the number of households in their 30s that owned homes in Seoul decreased by 7,893 from the previous year to 183,456, hitting an all-time low.
There were 2.9 times more non-homeowners than home-owning households, marking a record gap.
The number of home-owning households in their 30s in Seoul decreased steadily from 237,000 in 2015, slightly increased in 2021, and then fell again in 2023, dropping below the ‘200,000 mark’ to 191,349.
As non-home-owning households increased and home-owning households decreased, the home ownership rate fell.
Last year, the home ownership rate for households in their 30s in Seoul, which represents the proportion of home-owning households, recorded 25.8%.
The home ownership rate for households in their 30s in Seoul was 33.3% in 2015, fell to 30.9% in 2020, slightly rebounded to 31.2% in 2021, fell again to 29.3% in 2022, and dropped to 25% last year.
Nationwide, the home ownership rate for households in their 30s was 36.0%, falling for six consecutive years to record lows, but there is more than a 10 percentage point gap compared to Seoul. The focus on Seoul and the sharp rise in house prices in Seoul are impacting young people’s ability to own homes.
Delayed job entry and marriage are also analyzed as factors delaying the timing of home purchases. The number of single-person households in Seoul is particularly high, which is leading to a lower home ownership rate, according to a data agency official.
There is also speculation that the ultra-strong real estate policies introduced by the government this year have further raised the barriers to entry into the housing market. With tightened loan regulations, such as the Loan-to-Value (LTV) ratio, young people are increasingly saying that only the cash-rich can afford to buy homes.
Young people believe that owning a home is necessary for housing stability and asset building, even if one is a single-person household.
According to a report published last month by the Land and Housing Institute, a survey conducted last August to September of 700 young non-home-owning single-person households aged 19 to 39 nationwide found that 83.2% responded that “they need to buy a house in the future”.
The most needed support policies for youth housing stability were “support for home purchase funds” (24.3%), followed by “support for jeonse (long-term rental deposit) funds” (22.3%), “supply of public rental housing” (18.6%), and “supply of public sale housing” (14.4%).
[Table] Trends in Home Ownership and Non-Home Ownership of Heads of Households in their 30s in Seoul (unit: households)
[Provided by the National Data Agency National Statistics Portal (KOSIS). Redistribution and database use prohibited].