![\"A](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/news-p.v1.20260716.d6a53d9857de4ef78bf7386a4ee8e9b1_P1.jpg\"\/ "\\"Priced")
A view of a villa complex in Seoul on the 16th. News1<\/p>\nA view of a villa complex in Seoul on the 16th. News1<\/p>\n
Seoul’s housing market showed a stark divergence between apartments and villas (row houses and multi-unit dwellings) in transaction activity this year. While apartment sales, jeonse (a Korean lease system requiring a large lump-sum deposit instead of monthly rent), and monthly rent transactions all declined, villa sales and monthly rent transactions rose sharply. The shift is attributed to housing cost burdens and tighter lending regulations, which drove end users toward the relatively cheaper non-apartment market.<\/p>\n
According to an analysis of Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport (MOLIT) real transaction data by property platform Dabang on the 16th, Seoul apartment sales totaled 34,932 in the January-to-May period this year, down 1.4% from the same period last year (35,419). Jeonse transactions fell 24.5% from 66,884 to 50,501, the largest decline, while monthly rent transactions also dropped 3.9% from 50,967 to 49,004.<\/p>\n
By contrast, villa (row house and multi-unit dwelling) transactions showed a clear upward trend. Sales in the January-to-May period surged 45.8% from 13,215 to 19,273. Monthly rent transactions also rose 12.8% from 34,104 to 38,455. Jeonse transactions fell 3.0% from 23,539 to 22,830, but the decline was small compared with apartments. Total jeonse and monthly rent transactions for row houses and multi-unit dwellings increased 6.3% from 57,642 to 61,285, and the share of jeonse fell while the share of monthly rent rose from 59.2% to 62.7%, making the shift toward monthly rent more pronounced.<\/p>\n
Differences also emerged by size. Among apartments, sales of large units exceeding 135 square meters fell 26.3% from a year earlier, the steepest drop. By contrast, monthly rent transactions in the same size range rose 6.1%. Jeonse transactions declined across all sizes.<\/p>\n
For row houses and multi-unit dwellings, both sales and monthly rent transactions rose across all sizes. Sales in the range above 85 square meters to 102 square meters or less rose 80.9%, the highest growth rate. Monthly rent rose 33.6% in the large size range exceeding 135 square meters, the biggest gain.<\/p>\n
By district, polarization in apartment transactions was also clear. Sales rose 95.6% each in Geumcheon-gu and Dobong-gu, and also increased sharply in Nowon-gu (85.0%), Jungnang-gu (78.1%), and Gangbuk-gu (70.7%). By contrast, transactions dropped significantly in Han River belt areas such as Seongdong-gu (-63.6%), Mapo-gu (-49.8%), and Gwangjin-gu (-43.2%). Apartment jeonse transactions fell in all 24 districts except Jungnang-gu (12.1%).<\/p>\n
Villa sales increased in all 25 of Seoul’s districts. Gwangjin-gu recorded the highest growth rate at 95.7%, followed by Songpa-gu (82.4%) and Yeongdeungpo-gu (82.2%). Monthly rent transactions also rose in all 24 districts except Jung-gu (-4.4%).<\/p>\n
“The temperature gap between apartments and row houses and multi-unit dwellings in the Seoul property market is becoming clear,” a Dabang official said. “As tighter lending regulations coincide with a shortage of apartment jeonse supply, apartment sales demand appears to be shifting to row houses and multi-unit dwellings.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A view of a villa complex in Seoul on the 16th. News1 Seoul’s housing market showed a stark…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":89735,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[35329,47157,7640,47156,29789,47158,112,1871,47155],"class_list":["post-89734","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-seoul","tag-apartment-sales","tag-dabang","tag-jeonse","tag-lending-regulations","tag-monthly-rent","tag-non-apartment-market","tag-seoul","tag-seoul-housing-market","tag-villa-transactions"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/89734","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=89734"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/89734\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/89735"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=89734"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=89734"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=89734"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}