Seoul's apartments are seen from Namsan in central Seoul on Sept. 3.NEWS1
Seoul apartment prices have risen for 85 straight weeks, tying the longest streak on record.
Prices climbed 16.94 percent along the way, more than double the increase over the previous run of the same length. Prices turned higher in the week of Jan. 20, 2025, when the Korea Real Estate Board's weekly index of Seoul apartment values registered a gain of 0.004 percent.
The streak includes two holiday weeks — Lunar New Year holiday (Jan. 27) and Chuseok, the Korean harvest holiday (Oct. 6) — that were not published as stand-alone readings. The board surveys prices each Monday and publishes results the following Thursday; when a survey week falls entirely within a holiday, it's folded into the next release as a combined two-week change.
As a result, 85 weeks of continuous price gains are captured in 83 published readings.
The record it matches was set under the Moon Jae-in administration. Seoul apartment prices rose for 85 weeks from June 8, 2020, to Jan. 17, 2022. That run had no holiday gaps, so its published and measured weeks came to the same number. The phrase “crazy house prices” spread through the property industry during that stretch.
The current streak passed the third-longest run in the first quarter of this year. That one also came under Moon and covered 61 weeks, from Sept. 11, 2017, to Nov. 5, 2018, including an unpublished Chuseok week on Oct. 2, 2017. Prices rose a cumulative 9.22 percent over that stretch.
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Seoul apartment prices have now gained more than 0.2 percent per week for 17 consecutive weeks. Another increase in the next weekly release, due Thursday, would give the capital the longest and largest run of gains since the board began the series.
The current run has added 16.94 percent. The Moon-era run of the same length added 7.71 percent. The two stretches lasted the same length, and the force pushing prices up this time was far stronger.
The areas driving the gains have changed this time. Earlier climbs were led by the Gangnam region, which includes the Gangnam, Seocho and Songpa neighborhoods south of the Han River. This year the increases have come from outlying districts filled with mid- and low-priced apartments.
Seoul apartments, alongside the Jamsil Sports Complex, are seen from the Lotte Tower in Songpa District, southern Seoul, on Sept. 7.NEWS1
Seongbuk District in central Seoul rose 0.54 percent in the Aug. 31 survey, and Jungnang District in eastern Seoul rose 0.52 percent. Gangnam District in southern Seoul fell 0.41 percent over the same week, and neighboring Seocho District fell 0.23 percent.
Sale prices, jeonse (lump-sum deposit) and monthly rents are all climbing at once, a “triple surge” counted as a new feature of the current market.
“In past upswings, only certain areas and sale prices jumped,” Seo Jin-hyung, a professor of real estate law at Kwangwoon University, said. “It is more serious now, because sale prices on the outskirts and jeonse and monthly rents across the city are rising at the same time. Housing insecurity of a kind not experienced before is spreading.”
This article was originally written in Korean and translated by a bilingual reporter with the help of generative AI tools. It was then edited by a native English-speaking editor. All AI-assisted translations are reviewed and refined by our newsroom.
