President Says Home Prices Are Falling, but 'Nodogang' Rents Top 1 Million Won

Monthly rents hit record highs in 24 Seoul districts, excluding Seocho-gu

Average monthly rent for Seoul apartments reaches 1,661,000 won

Only Jungnang-gu remains below 1 million won

More semi-jeonse contracts keep deposits unchanged and raise monthly rent

Jamsil Els 84-square-meter unit: 100 million won deposit, 5.2 million won monthly rent

While home sale prices in Gangnam have weakened, monthly rents for apartments and row houses and multi-family homes (villas) in Seoul have surged to record highs. Even outlying areas such as Nowon, Dobong and Gangbuk have seen monthly rents exceed 1 million won. President Lee Jae-myung expressed confidence that the market would stabilize, saying home prices in major parts of Seoul were falling, but the housing reality tenants are experiencing is moving in the opposite direction. In particular, monthly rents have risen much faster than deposits, intensifying the housing cost burden felt by ordinary people.

A view of an apartment complex in Nowon-gu, Seoul. Nowon-gu

According to monthly statistics released by the Korea Real Estate Board on November 4, the average monthly rent for Seoul apartments in September 2026 was 1,661,000 won, up 15.1% from a year earlier. Average monthly rent for row houses and multi-family homes also rose 7.4% over the same period to 680,000 won. Both apartments and villas set new highs since the statistics were first compiled in July 2015.

By district, 24 of Seoul's 25 districts, all except Seocho-gu, recorded their highest monthly rents on record in September 2026. This followed record highs in all 25 districts in August, with 24 districts setting new records again just a month later. In Seocho-gu, a series of move-ins to large complexes, including Raemian Trini One in August and The H Bangbae in September, increased the supply of rental units, which appears to have put downward pressure on rents as well. In five districts—Seongdong-gu, Gangbuk-gu, Dobong-gu, Seodaemun-gu and Dongjak-gu—average monthly rents rose by double-digit percentages even though average rental deposits did not increase from a year earlier.

As rent increases spread to outlying areas, Jungnang-gu, at 989,000 won, was the only one of Seoul's 25 districts where average apartment rent remained below 1 million won. Meanwhile, the number of districts with average monthly rents above 2 million won rose to six from four a year earlier. Over the past year, rents surged 23.3% in Gwangjin-gu and 22.4% in Songpa-gu. Even in Nowon, Dobong and Gangbuk, areas with many mid- and lower-priced apartment complexes, high-rent contracts of 2.5 million to 3 million won per month are being signed one after another, particularly for newly built apartments and larger units.

The villa market showed a similar trend. In September 2026, monthly rents for villas and officetels reached record highs in all five of Seoul's major living zones. Deposits either fell or remained unchanged, while rents alone rose. In the central zone, which includes Jongno-gu, Yongsan-gu and Jung-gu, deposits fell 0.8% over the year while rents jumped 9.8%. In the southeastern zone, which includes the four Gangnam districts—Gangnam-gu, Seocho-gu, Songpa-gu and Gangdong-gu—as well as the northeastern, northwestern and southwestern zones, deposits changed only slightly, while rents alone rose by around 7%.

While rents surged, deposits remained little changed from a year earlier. In September 2026, average rental deposits for both apartments and row houses and multi-family homes rose just 0.6% from a year earlier. This reflects the growing number of semi-jeonse contracts, in which tenants pay a deposit and monthly rent, with only the monthly rent increasing. Regulations on loans have made it harder for tenants to obtain the lump sums needed to raise their deposits, while landlords have come to prefer cash income over interest on deposits. As a result, rent increases appear to have been concentrated in monthly payments.

The share of monthly rentals is growing rapidly. According to the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport's actual transaction price disclosure system, of the 427 renewed Seoul apartment contracts in September 2026 that converted existing jeonse leases to monthly rentals, including semi-jeonse and mixed deposit-and-rent contracts, 370, or 86.7%, kept the deposit at its previous level or raised it while adding monthly rent. The share of contracts in which deposits were maintained or increased was up 7.5 percentage points from 79.2% in September 2025. Of the 2,165 renewals of existing monthly rental contracts that included a rent increase, 1,701, or 78.6%, kept the deposit unchanged and raised only the monthly rent.

A tenant in an 84-square-meter unit at Jamsil Els in Songpa-gu, Seoul, renewed their contract in September 2026, keeping the deposit at 100 million won while raising the monthly rent by 1.5 million won, from 3.7 million to 5.2 million won. A tenant in an 84-square-meter unit at nearby Ricenz also agreed to pay an additional 1.34 million won in monthly rent, raising it from 1.36 million to 2.7 million won while keeping the deposit at 700 million won. A tenant in an 84-square-meter unit at Guui Hyundai 2 Complex in Gwangjin-gu renewed their lease as a semi-jeonse contract, keeping the existing jeonse deposit of 630 million won and adding a monthly payment of 1.1 million won. Meanwhile, a tenant in an 84-square-meter unit at Raemian One Bailey in Seocho-gu raised the jeonse deposit by 400 million won, from 1.1 billion to 1.5 billion won, and took on a new monthly rent payment of 800,000 won.

As jeonse becomes scarce and monthly rentals become the norm, tenants without homes are finding it harder to save seed money. From January through September 2026, monthly rentals accounted for 52.7% of Seoul's apartment lease transactions, exceeding half for the first time, and 78.2% of transactions for non-apartment housing, including villas. Seoul's apartment jeonse-to-monthly-rent conversion rate, the annualized rate applied when converting a deposit into monthly rent, reached 4.8% in August 2026, its highest level in three years, since August 2023. This means that when an apartment's jeonse price rises from 600 million to 700 million won, a tenant who converts the 100 million won increase into monthly rent at a conversion rate of 4.8% would pay 4.8 million won a year, or 400,000 won a month. Even if the tenant deposited the 100 million won not paid to the landlord in a bank and earned 3.5 million won in annual interest at a 3.5% rate, living in the apartment on a 700 million won jeonse deposit would still cost 1.3 million won more per year.

Government policy appears focused on the home sales market. At a Cabinet meeting on November 3, President Lee said, "Actual transaction prices in major areas are falling to a surprising degree," adding, "Some are beginning to worry about a steep drop in housing prices in the Seoul metropolitan area. The government needs to explain the objective data properly." Critics, however, say the government is turning a blind eye to the sharp rise in jeonse and monthly rents and the housing cost burden that directly affect the lives of people without homes.

Cho Jung-heun, chair of the Land and Housing Committee at the Citizens' Coalition for Economic Justice, said, "The government is looking only at sales prices for high-end apartments, but about 80% of Seoul's jeonse and monthly rental transactions involve mid- and lower-priced homes with deposits of 600 million won or less." She added, "As guarantees for jeonse deposits are reduced and the fallout from reverse-jeonse spreads, existing homes are tied up in auctions and even new supply is drying up, forcing young people and ordinary households into monthly rentals as if they were being driven out."

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