Large-sized apartment prices in Seoul surpasses W2b mark

The market price of large-sized apartments in Seoul surpassed the 2 billion won ($1.69 million) mark in August, reflecting the unsubdued housing price rally in popular areas, industry data showed Friday.

According to the monthly housing price trend report by KB Kookmin Bank, the average transaction price for large-sized apartments came to 2.03 billion won, exceeding the milestone for the first time since the bank started tallying such data in 2016.

The latest figure was up 171.54 million won, or 9.2 percent, from a year earlier and 290.5 million won, or 16.7 percent, from two years earlier.

“Large-sized” apartments, under housing statistics, refer to those that exceed 135 square meters in terms of exclusive use area.

The regional average for the 14 districts north of the Han River -- dubbed the Gangbuk area -- stood at 1.51 billion won, while that of the relatively more affluent Gangnam area came to 2.19 billion won.

Hitting a record-high was Tower Palace, a premium high-rise complex in Gangnam-gu’s Dogok-dong, where a residential unit with exclusive use space of 236 square meters was sold for 5.42 billion won in late July.

The champion in the Gangbuk area was the Hangang Bamseom Xi complex in Mapo-gu where a 138 square-meter apartment was sold for 2.06 billion won earlier this month, up 160 million won from a month earlier.

Skepticism lingers, however, on whether large-sized apartments will continue the price rally, in light of the government’s enhanced taxation rules on expensive apartments and the recently decreased volume of transaction in the Gangnam region.

“”Apartment prices have been on an uptrend but the increasing pace has been slowing down lately,” said an official of the Korea Appraisal Board.

“As speculative demand has diminished under newly added regulations, it is unlikely that end users will fully embrace the escalating prices.”

By Bae Hyun-jung (tellme@heraldcorp.com)