South Korea’s housing market players have turned decisively pessimistic about future business conditions amid hard-line government housing policy and murky redevelopment prospects.

According to a survey on 500 members of the Korea Housing Association and Korea Housing Builders Association conducted by the Korea Housing Institute, the Housing Business Survey Index for November stood at 47.4, sharply retreating from 69.0 in the previous month and first dip below 50 since January last year.

In the institute’s scale of 0 to 200, 100 is neutral. Business sentiment has been deteriorating fast upon a slew of strict housing policy - taxing on top of loan regulation.

Constructors’ order forecast also deteriorated with indices for house remodeling, redevelopment as well as infrastructure projects all hovering below the confidence threshold of 100. The index for house remodeling projects fell 9.6 points to 76.9 while the figure for housing redevelopment projects sank 9.1 points to 75.5. The reading for public land development projects stopped at 84.3, down 2.9 points from the previous month.

Sentiment was worst in Seoul with the confidence index further sinking to 73.8 from previous month’s 80.8. The index in regional places declined 20 points on average compared to last month.

By Chu Dong-hun and Cho Jeehyun

[ⓒ Pulse by Maeil Business Newspaper & mk.co.kr, All rights reserved]