A view of downtown Gangneung, Gangwon Province. [Yonhap]
A view of downtown Gangneung, Gangwon Province. [Yonhap]

The Korea Housing and Urban Guarantee Corporation (HUG) announced Thursday that it has designated four areas as unsold-unit management zones for August, including the newly added city of Gangneung in Gangwon Province.

Under the latest designation, Busan's Sasang-gu was removed from the list while Gangneung was added, keeping the total number of monitored areas unchanged from the previous month at four.

The four designated zones had a combined total of 6,828 unsold units as of June, accounting for about 10.1 percent of the national unsold housing inventory of 67,464 units.

An area qualifies for designation as an unsold-unit management zone when it has at least 1,000 unsold units and an unsold-unit ratio of 2 percent or more relative to its total apartment stock, and meets at least one of the following conditions: a rise in unsold units, slow absorption of unsold inventory, or concerns over future unsold supply. Developers seeking project financing (PF) guarantees to launch pre-sales in a designated zone must first undergo a preliminary review by HUG.

Further details on the PF guarantee preliminary review process and zone designations are available through HUG's website, call center and regional sales offices nationwide.

Meanwhile, Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport data showed that as of June, so-called "toxic" unsold units — apartments that remain unsold after completion — exceeded 25,000 in non-metropolitan areas, reaching 25,091. In the Greater Seoul area, the figure stood at 4,695 at the end of July, down from 4,828 the month before.


hwshin@heraldcorp.com