Finding Rents in Korea(NEW 2020)_Part 1

From finding rents to moving in.

This renting guide is for anyone who’s looking for housing in Korea. If you are having trouble finding rent or don’t know how to start, this guide will help you sort out all matters from A to Z. The guide is separated in to three section by timeline; things to know before finding rents, when finding rents and after moving in. This is the full concierge of rents in Korea, so don’t miss out!

The following contents are:

1. What you need to know before looking for rents
2. How to look for rents
3. What to check when visiting potential rents
4. What to be considered when signing the contract
5. How to move in
6. What to do after moving in

Now Let’s get down to it!

What you need to know before looking for rents

There are set of factors you must consider when looking for rents in Korea. Whether you consider these factors mentioned below or not, could highly affect the quality of the rent you’ll be getting.

Rent vocabularies in Korean

Before we jump right in, check out some basic Korean numeric terms. Knowing the terms makes the full process whole lot easier and helps you not get confused.

• Monetary terms: Korean digits in monetary term are high, can easily get confused, plus normally on contracts they write terms in Korean word, not in numeric terms, for instance, 1억 2천만 which equals about 99,000 USD.
• 천: thousand, add three 0s
• 만: ten-thousand, add four 0s
• 억: hundred-million, add eight 0s
• Size terms: Conventionally we use term called ‘pyeong’, now we are shifting to using square meters, but a lot of landlords and real estate agents are still used to using this term.
• 1평(pyeong)= 3.3 square-meter= 36 square-foot
• 6평(= 20 square-meter= 216 square-foot) is typical size for one-room accommodation.

These are pretty much all the numeric term you need to get familiar with, seems complicated but not too much.

Accommodation Types

There are three different way to classify accommodation types; what building type it is, how many rooms the accommodation have and what floor it’s on. All these factors affects the price and size each and respectively, knowing all these options helps you to get the most suitable rent.

• Building type

1) Apartments(아파트):

One of the most pricy option is Korea, but also most common for families. In other western nations families live in individual houses but, here, we live in apartments. These apartment buildings are at least 10 stories high and ones with same brand name holds one complex. These complex have parking lots, fitness centers and other facilities inside which are exclusively provided for their residents. Because of this the utility bill tends to be expensive. Typical size provided would differ, but normally from 24–54 pyeong(=79 to 178 square-meter).

2) Officetel(오피스텔):

Literal combination of office and hotel, residents can either use the place as an office or residence, normally higher than 10 stories. Residents have access to certain facilities provided by each building. Officetels are smaller in size than apartments usually studio type with one room or two at most, making it more affordable than apartments in rent cost. As for the utility bill, cheaper than apartments but still tends to be expensive.

3) Villas(빌라):

Normally in Korea, villa does not mean a fancy place, think of it as individual apartment with no more than 5 stories high, mostly consisting one-room per each household. The typical size will be 6pyeong (= 20 square-meter). Monthly rent and utility bills are much cheaper than the former two.

4) Houses(주택):

Possibly being the most expensive and rarest type of housing in Korea are houses. Renting the whole house in the metropolitan area requires the high rent and utility bill. However, where you are trying to relocate is rather rural area or suburbs, the prices can become more affordable.

• room numbers

Sometimes real estate agents ask how many rooms you want, instead of asking what kind of building. So it’s important to decide how many room you are planning to have in advance.

1) One-room(원룸):

Normally size of 6 pyeong (= 20 square-meter), kitchen, living space all in one space except for bathroom. Some offer separated one-room, meaning there’s sliding door between kitchen and living space, but basically one-room.

2) Two-room:

The size can differ in broad range, but normally bigger than 10 pyeong ( = 33 square-meter). Except for living room, there are two more rooms. Kitchen is usually separated from other spaces.

3) Three-room(투룸):

Like the two-room, the size can differ in wide range but bigger in size than former two in general. Other than living room, there are three more rooms, the kitchen being separated from other spaces.

These three are most common options. If you are looking for bigger house, you can find one but it will require bigger budget in every aspect.

• Which floor:

Depending on which floor your rent is the price can vary highly, normally the higher, the more expensive. Here, we are just going to define in three types.

1) Basement floor(반지하):

Generally know as ‘반지하’(ban-jiha) in Korea, literally meaning half-basement, if you have seen the movie ‘Parasite’, you have the idea. Basically half is under ground and the other half is above the ground. So when you look out the window you can see people’s feet. In most of cases, people don’t prefer to live in this type. Main downsides are safety issue, people can see your room and can break in easily if they try, high humidity, making it fragile to getting molds, smells and sometimes bugs, and lastly less sunlights. However, there’s one huge advantage about basement type that overcomes all the downsides. It’s way cheaper than any other option, sometimes bigger in sizes too. If you are on budget, this is the option you want to consider. They usually exist in villas, never in apartment or officetels.

2) Ground floor and up:

Most people prefer to live in these floors. If you are planning getting rent in the apartment or officetel, the higher, the more expensive it is. But if it’s villa, getting rent higher than 3rd floor can be exhausting because they normally don’t have elevators. There’s nothing much to say about these floors, they don’t have major downsides, just higher in rent fee.

3) Rooftop rooms(옥탑방):

We call it ‘oktop’(옥탑) here, this kind of room exist on top of villas mostly, never in apartments or officetels. Some prefers it, because the room can be quite romantic in the sense where you can see the view of all your neighborhood and if the rooftop space for your exclusive use, you can take time alone outside on the rooftop or invite friends. However, there are some major downsides, it’s cold in winter, hot in summer and there’s a lot of bugs, making the place rather hard to manage, because of these factors, normally the rent is cheaper than ground floors.

Rent types

Now, you have considered all matters regarding accommodation types, luckily you may have gotten the idea of what kind of room you want specifically. Now, It’s time to consider rent types, aka ‘The Money Time!’

• Monthly rent( 월세/ Wolse):

It works the same way as the other part of the world does, you pay deposit in the beginning of the rent and pay the rent every month, later when the contract terminates you get your deposit back. If the deposit is higher, the rent is cheaper, and the vice versa.

• Key money rent( 전세/ Jeonse):

This system called ‘jeonse’, only exist in Korea. Here’s how it works; you pay a large amount of deposit, so-called ‘key money’, to the landlord, normally 40–50 % of market value of the accommodation, and don’t pay any rent. When the contract terminates, usually 2 years contract, you get your deposit money back.

• Half key money rent (반전세/ Ban-jeonse):

Think of this as monthly rent with sizable deposit and very low rent; key money is lower than jeonse type and rent is lower than wolse type.

All these types are generally subjected to two-year contract, if you negotiate with the landlord you can make it shorter or longer. However, breaking the contract early will required you to pay real estate agency brokerage for finding the new tenant in all three cases. Normally, you have to give the landlord notice three month prior to leaving date, the law requires a month prior but if you consider getting back your deposit, it’s better to tell them within three month. This is because the landlords also need time to pull out money for giving you back the deposit and get a new tenant, especially when it’s jeonse, they need the new tenant to give you back the deposit.

If you have sufficient cash with you or able to pull out loans, getting jeonse or half-jeonse type will be cost-efficient and have the better chance of getting bigger house with better conditions. If not, you will need to find wolse type with reasonable rent and fine condition.

Utility bill types based on accommodation type and how to pay

Other than rents or key money, you need to consider the utility bills, generally called as ‘guanlibi’(관리비) in korean, they needed to be paid separately. This is important because even if the rent is low, after adding up utility bills the total cost may not be so low after all. Since what you need to pay as utility bill and how you pay could differ by your accommodation type, below will explain utility bills based on accommodation types.

• Villa:

There are two types of utility bills, one that you pay to your landlord and the other you have to pay to the government. The former is fixed cost which considered as the maintenance cost, like cleaning the hallways or elevators, however some landlord includes internet cable, tv cable or water bills. What the maintenance fee includes is totally up to the landlord, the more it includes, the higher it gets. Average cost is about 50,000won (41 USD) and may require more than 100,000won (82 USD), if the maintenance fee includes all utility bills such as gas and electricity. So take careful look at the utility bill and what are included. The utility factors that are not included will come as notice every month on yellow paper and you just need to send the money to the account that’s written on the notice.

• Apartment & Officetel:

They also require two separate types; maintenance fee to the apartment complex/officetel management office which all household splits equally each month and the utility bills for water, gas and electricity. As for internet and tv cables, you need to sign up independently. Maintenance fee in general for these two are expensive, since it’s part of whole complex and there are a lot of facilities for residents within it. However, many of the cases officetel maintenance fee tends to be more costly, since the residents are less and common area is large compared to how many residents they have. Utility fees come as individual notice on yellow paper every month to your postbox, you just need to send the noticed amount to the account written.

• Houses:

You don’t pay maintenance fee, instead you’ll most likely be doing the maintenance job yourself. For other utility bills, the notice will be sent your postbox.

Location types

Now, you have considered accommodation types, rent terms and utility bills. There’s one last factor you need to consider before jumping into finding house, it’s the location. For the location, you will need to think about which side of the city you want to be in, how far is your place to the metros, bus stations, your workplace or school. These are just typical considerings, you may add some other condition regarding your preferences. But here we are just going to focus on general conditions and give basic ideas about Seoul rent prices in accordance with some major districts.

To start with, you need to consider these factors:

• Transportation convenience: closeness to metro, bus stations, how far the neighbor is to major city areas
• metropolitan area closeness: generally suggesting office areas and city centers
• Universities Closeness: preferred by students, always more demands than supplies
• Conventionally affluent neighborhood: having this reputation makes the neighborhood preferable in all aspects
• Entertaining/ Uprising neighborhood: always the hottest place in the city, preferred by many
• Educational area: preferred by many parents
• Perceived as not so safe neighborhood: where the crime rates tends to be high

Each of these factors determines the price of rents, preferable factors making the price higher and vice versa.

Based on these we have organized some widely known neighbors for the main factors listed above. The map below analyzes what district has what neighborhood based on metro stations as it being perceived as the most convenient and common transportation in Seoul.

Main university areas in Seoul, majority of university students live around these areas

Conventionally expensive areas & affordable areas

Widely known Entertainment-Clustered Area (aka. nightlife)

Metropolitan areas, most of major offices are around these neighborhoods

These analysis will help where to look for the rents depending on one’s preferences. However, this is just a general analysis, something that for the locals they know by experiences thereby the idea being almost naturally intrinsic, so for more details you will need to do more research yourself.

Assuming that there are more demands on ‘university areas’ & ‘affordable/expensive areas, we’ve analyzed the chart below to elaborate in more details.

The chart below is to explains briefly about what ‘university areas’ and ‘Affordable/ Expensive areas’ are. This may give you the basic idea for where to look for rents but the cost given refers to general average of only certain type of accommodation with less than 33 square-meters rooms so they may differ in reality depending on your deposit, accommodation type and other factors mentioned above.

Recommendations

Based on all the information given above, you may have figured out what rent is most suitable for you and what locations to look for.

Considering that in many cases, ones are with sufficient cash have less problems that gets in to their ways, in this section we will give some recommendations specifically for accommodation types, rent types and location types to students and to those who are on budget.

The most affordable accommodation type is villa with one-room type, yet if you are willing to get more bargain then you can go for villa with one-room type on basement floor, this is the cheapest you can ever get. As for the location, if you are a student, its best for you to get a rent nearby your school, however, if the neighborhood is too expensive than look away to two three stations away neighborhood, the price usually gets much cheaper. If this doesn’t seem to work either look into neighborhoods that shares the same metro line with your university.

And for those who are working, refer to the chart that shows the most affordable neighborhoods and see which one is closest to your work. Most genuinely preferred areas are 2–5 referring to map above. But remember, in most of the cases you get what you paid for.

How to look for rents

By now, you would totally know what you want for the rent. Then what are the means to find the rent in Korea? One is the rent brokerages app and the other is directly visiting the real estate agencies.

Rent brokerage app

Dabang(left)/ Zigbang(right), the two most prevalent rent searching apps in Korea

In last couple of years, people started to look for houses on apps. People no longer have to move around areas and visit real estate agency on foot, they can pick the room they like on app and contact the agency that has the room directly. Then they will assign an agent for you where you make an appointment to see the rent you asked for. In most cases, they may show you around some other rooms that are with similar conditions, so it is important to know what kind of rent you are looking for in detail.

The two main apps used in Korea are ‘Dabang’ and ‘Zigbang’, they almost have all the rooms listed. On the apps you can search the rooms by locations, usually referring to metro stations or administrative districts. Also you get to filter your options which includes the price range, utility bill range, what floor the rent is on and even how far the place is from the nearest metro station. You even get to see the reviews of each real estate agency who are doing the brokerage for the rooms. How to use these are apps are well-detailed and well-translated in our App Introduction post, will surely be helpful.

Real estate agency

Visiting the real estate agency directly is the conventionally way of finding rents. Though in Korea, real estate agency is not difficult to find, it may be difficult to find English speaking agencies. You can click here to check out the list of English speaking agencies that are confirmed by the Seoul city government.

When you visit the agency you need to know precisely what you are looking for, meaning in prior to visiting, you need to decide the area, neighborhood conditions, deposit range, monthly rent range, the type of accommodation you are looking for and the size of the room. Just coming by in vague manner, you may end up with some random room, even if there could have been much better choices.

According to your requests the agency will show you the rooms that matches your standards. This is the common saying in Korea, keep this in mind!Real estate agency

Visiting the real estate agency directly is the conventionally way of finding rents. Though in Korea, real estate agency is not difficult to find, it may be difficult to find English speaking agencies. You can click here to check out the list of English speaking agencies that are confirmed by the Seoul city government. When you visit the agency you need to know precisely what you are looking for, meaning in prior to visiting, you need to decide the area, neighborhood conditions, deposit range, monthly rent range, the type of accommodation you are looking for and the size of the room. Just coming by in vague manner, you may end up with random room, even if there could have been much better choices.According to your requests the agency will show you the rooms that matches your standards.

There a common saying in Korea,

“The more agency you go, the more rooms you see, the better chances of finding the right rent”

Below is the brokerage fee in Seoul, the fee may differ depending on each province.

What to be aware of

1) Be aware of fake photos on apps

• On apps the photos of rooms all looks so perfect and the rent price also seems quite reasonable. But they may be fakes as an attempt for agencies trying to lure potential customers. The better the photos are, the bigger possibility of customers contacting them via app.
• Tips: if you are worried about fake photo scam, look in to reviews of each agency that possess the room which seems just right for you. When the reviews say that the agency is a total scam, do not contact the agency. It’s obvious that they don’t have the room or have any potential room that suits your standards.

2) January, February, August are busy season, so be quick!

• Unlike other parts of the world, our first semester starts in March, so a lot of students wants to find rooms before the semester start, making January, February a busy season. August is also busy, but not as much as its counterpart, because the second semester begins at September. So during these seasons, make sure you make the appointment with the agency first, if you just come by without appointments, the visit may end in vain.

3) Be picky with real estate agents

• This is important because they are sweet talkers. And the more picky you are, the more chance that they will show you the better rents. Many cases they save the better choices for later, so be picky to get better offers!

4) Make sure your agent has the license

• It’s obvious but sometimes it happens. Before you make any deal check whether they have the license. Sometimes in one agency, there’s only one who has the license and making it seem like they all have one, so be careful! One way to avoid this is asking for receipts for brokerage fee, this way they can’t scam you, even if they do, you can always claim on it. Many will ask you to pay in cash or make transaction to their account, you can still ask for receipts in these cases, so please do ask for receipts!

5) Do not make direct deal with the landlord

• Many wouldn’t consider doing the direct deal, but still do not consider doing it. They are huge liability, not even the locals consider it as an option. You may save real estate agent brokerage fee, yet, you might end up losing all your deposit or down payment.

Now, we have covered every aspects for what to consider before finding rents. If want to find out more tips & guide about checking potential rents to signing the contract,

continue reading next section>>

Finding Rents in Korea(NEW 2020)_Part 2

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