Lee Sung-hoon, president of the Korea Land & Housing Corporation (LH), said on the 6th that he would offer the "LH Seoul Regional Headquarters" in Nonhyeon-dong, Gangnam District, Seoul, as dwellings for young people. It is part of expanding urban dwelling supply by using idle land and aging office buildings. He also plans to sharply shorten compensation and administrative procedures to speed up supply.
At a press briefing in Jongno District, Seoul, that day, his first since taking office, Lee said, "As the agency executing dwelling supply, we looked for ways to take the lead," adding, "We decided to provide the LH Seoul Regional Headquarters, which has a 52-year history, as a youth housing space."
The LH Seoul Regional Headquarters is a building with two basement floors and five above-ground floors at 254 Nonhyeon-dong, Gangnam District. The site area is 6,588㎡, and the floor area ratio is 109.32%. It is located near transit hubs by Gangnam-gu Office Station and Seonjeongneung Station and sits within a residential cluster.
The site served as the headquarters of the Korea National Housing Corporation starting in 1973, and after the office building moved to Bundang District, Seongnam, in 1997, it was used as a regional headquarters. Since LH was launched, it has been used as the LH Seoul Regional Headquarters from 2009. Under the Moon Jae-in administration, authorities announced through the Aug. 4, 2020 supply plan that they would build 200 public rental dwellings at the LH Seoul Regional Headquarters, but the plan was ultimately scrapped.
Lee said that boosting the pace of dwelling supply to stabilize the real estate market is the most urgent task now, and that he would shorten procedures across projects to ensure swift dwelling supply.
Lee said, "We need to raise groundbreaking starts on public housing sites, but there have been shortcomings for several years, so it is important to accelerate so people can feel the impact," adding, "Previously, dwelling supply proceeded in series, with stage B starting only after stage A ended. Going forward, we will parallelize by handling tasks simultaneously wherever possible."
Lee added, "We will move up whatever can be done first, such as conducting appraisals before preliminary procedures are completed, and we will work with relevant ministries, including the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport, to improve systems that act as roadblocks."
In particular, to speed up compensation work, cited as the biggest cause of delays in dwelling supply, the plan is to sharply expand staffing.
Lee said, "We aim to drastically shorten the compensation process, which takes the most time before groundbreaking," adding, "With compensation volumes rising sharply, it is difficult to cope with existing staff alone, so we will significantly increase compensation personnel." He continued, "We plan to greatly add temporary staff, and because sufficient compensation is needed to improve performance, we will pay temporary workers more than full-time employees and, where possible, deploy experienced personnel to dramatically raise the speed of compensation."
Lee also put forward a revamp of organizational culture as a priority for expanding supply. He said, "LH employees, despite having nothing to do with the speculation scandal involving some staff in the past, have suffered damaged reputations and low morale for a long time," adding, "To speed up supply, boosting employee morale is paramount, and we will work to ensure that, whatever (LH reform) plan the government announces, employee morale does not drop and slow supply."
As for liabilities rising due to LH's direct implementation and funding for dwelling supply, Lee expects no major issues for the time being. He said, "This year and next, I believe financing will be smooth regardless of the liability ratio," while explaining, "If we expand direct implementation, we will not sell land immediately, delaying the timing of revenue collection, and liabilities will inevitably increase during that period."
Lee added, "Because state-owned enterprise management evaluations are designed to strictly control liabilities, the more we supply, the more disadvantageous the structure becomes," saying, "We are consulting with government ministries to change aspects that result in losses due to (management evaluations)."