"Home prices rose, but our incomes didn't." "People who have lived in one home for decades should not be treated as speculators." These are among the voices Seocho-gu residents raised against the government's Aug. 3 real estate tax reform plan.
Carrying those concerns, Seocho-gu Mayor Jeon Sung-su delivered 2,461 opinions submitted directly by residents to the Ministry of Economy and Finance on Thursday. "I hope the government will listen carefully to the voices people feel on the ground and come up with a reasonable set of supplementary measures," Jeon said.
The district collected resident opinions through online and in-person channels through Wednesday, gathering input as the frontline body of local tax administration to relay to the central government. A total of 2,461 submissions came in within just three days of the collection period opening, confirming strong public attention to the reform plan and widespread anxiety over the tax burden it would impose.
The most prominent theme running through the submissions was not a simple objection to higher taxes, but a call to distinguish between people who have owned a single home their entire lives and those who hold multiple properties for speculative purposes.
Many submissions carried appeals along the lines of: "New tax burdens should not be suddenly imposed on people who held their homes for years in good faith under the existing regime."
Residents expressed particular concern about the prospect of a heavier tax burden driven by rising home prices even as retirement had reduced their incomes. The submissions drew a clear distinction between the "asset value" of a home and the actual "ability to pay" taxes on it.
Residents also warned that applying policy changes over a short period to homeowners who had held their properties for years or decades in reliance on existing provisions — such as the long-term holding special deduction — could force people to leave homes they had lived in their whole lives due to an unforeseeable tax burden. There were also requests that homes acquired as an unavoidable second unit during reconstruction or redevelopment association processes be granted tax benefits equivalent to those for single-homeowners.
The district forwarded all 2,461 submissions to the government without filtering or rewriting them to reflect the district's own position. Drawing on its direct experience listening to taxpayers, the district also separately submitted three recommendations to the government.
The key recommendations were: establishing relief mechanisms that account for the actual tax-paying capacity of long-term single-homeowners; providing sufficient transitional provisions to ensure predictability for existing homeowners; and setting reasonable tax standards for single-homeowners who do not reside in their property.
Meanwhile, the district will hold three sessions of a "real estate tax reform resident briefing" starting Tuesday to inform residents of the plan's main contents. Demand has been high — all 1,320 first-come, first-served spots have already been filled. In response, the district plans to make the briefing videos available later through the Seocho-gu Tax Division's YouTube channel so more residents can access the information.
"The 2,461 opinions we delivered this time reflect the very real worry residents feel — that they may have to leave the homes they have lived in their whole lives simply because prices went up," Jeon said. "I hope the government will take a close look at what people are actually experiencing during this tax reform process and put together a reasonable set of supplementary measures."
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