Apartment Sales Fall to All-Time Low

Apartment sales across the country have fallen to a record low due to fears of increasing interest rates on housing loans.

According to the Korea Real Estate Board on Sunday, only 155,987 apartments were sold across the country in the first five months of this year, the lowest since the government began tallying such figures in 2006.

The only other times when apartment sales fell below 200,000 from January to May was in 2012 and 2019. In the same period last year, apartment sales totaled 315,153.

Sales were particularly slow in the Seoul metropolitan area, where prices are sky-high, at 7,917 or just one-third of the level a year earlier. Nowon district saw the highest number of sales in Seoul last year but just 523 transactions until May this year, down a whopping 79 percent on-year.

The proportion of apartments in total real estate sales fell to a record-low 27.9 percent.

The lethargic market and weakened demand are raising fears among people who took out huge loans to buy apartments.

Market analyst Koh Jong-hwan said, "Weak apartment prices are not due to an increase in supply of new homes but because demand has fallen. Of course prices that soared under the previous government need to stabilize, but an abnormal decline in sales is not desirable either."