"Landlord Credit Information and Mortgage Rights at a Glance"... Ministry of Land to Launch Jeonse Fraud Prevention Service in September

Provision of Credit Information and Seniority of Deposit Data
Legislative Push to Adjust Timing for Establishment of Tenant Rights

Starting in September, users will be able to check risk information related to jeonse fraud—including seniority of deposit claims, mortgage rights, and delinquency status—all at once through the Safe Jeonse Application (App) provided by the Housing and Urban Guarantee Corporation (HUG).

On June 18, the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport announced at a joint inspection meeting with relevant agencies, held to review the implementation status of measures to prevent jeonse fraud, that it will push forward with the establishment of a service providing jeonse fraud risk information.

Previously, prospective tenants faced procedural inconvenience as they had to obtain the landlord's consent and visit multiple government offices to acquire information about the seniority of rights on a rental property before signing a contract. Even after securing all this information, many tenants found it difficult to analyze the complex hierarchy of prior rights and assess the level of risk.

To address this, the Ministry plans to provide jeonse fraud prevention information through the HUG Safe Jeonse App starting in September. Alongside information on illegal structures, the app will display housing risk levels—such as comparisons between market price, deposit, and seniority of deposit claims—and the landlord’s risk level, analyzed from delinquency and credit information, in an easily understandable format labeled as 'Safe', 'Caution', or 'Risk'. However, access to credit and delinquency information will require the landlord's consent. In addition, the government is pursuing agreements to allow this service to be used on private real estate platforms such as Dabang, Zigbang, and KB Real Estate.

Along with building the jeonse fraud prevention information service, the government is also accelerating the amendment of the Housing Lease Protection Act to adjust the timing for the establishment of a tenant’s legal right to assert the lease against third parties (so-called “opposability”). The current plan is to change the effective time of opposability from midnight of the day following the moving-in report to immediate effect upon filing the report. If the timing for opposability is advanced, the government also plans to establish a comparison system that can accurately check the chronological order of registered rights and opposability down to the hour, minute, and second. At the same time, measures to strengthen the explanatory obligations of licensed real estate agents are also underway.

Lee Tak Kim, the First Vice Minister of the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport, stressed, "Jeonse fraud, which is a social disaster, can be significantly reduced simply by properly checking senior rights and avoiding risks. The government will integrate information scattered across administrative networks into resources that the public can actually use during contract processes, and will make sure tenants can sign contracts with peace of mind by overseeing this effort until the end."

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.