Oh Se-hoon says president's real estate views unsettle market every time they surface

Seoul Mayor Oh Se-hoon on Friday described President Lee Jae Myung's nationally televised real estate policy forum as "a bitter occasion that only reconfirmed the president's deep-seated bias and distorted perception toward redevelopment and reconstruction."

Oh posted the remarks on Facebook, taking direct aim at comments Lee made at the forum questioning whether reconstruction projects meaningfully increase housing supply. Lee had said that while the number of units sometimes rises through reconstruction, larger floor areas per unit mean the net gain "does not seem to increase all that much." Oh called the position a flat contradiction. "He acknowledges there is virtually no land left in Seoul to build on, yet denies the supply effect of redevelopment and reconstruction — the only large-scale supply mechanism that remains," Oh said. "Where is the logic in that?"

Oh said the president's remarks were also factually wrong. "The redevelopment projects Seoul is pursuing, with a target of breaking ground on more than 310,000 units by 2031, are expected to produce a net increase of about 87,000 units — roughly 2.7 times the 32,000-unit net supply gain for Seoul under the government's Jan. 29 measures," he said. He added that reconstruction projects are generating a net increase of about 40 percent on average, while redevelopment projects are also delivering an average supply gain of around 15 percent as the Seoul Metropolitan Government actively pursues zoning upgrades and floor-area-ratio relaxations.

Oh acknowledged that, as the president noted, some redevelopment projects in areas dense with multi-family homes do see a modest reduction in the number of units depending on how existing households are counted. "But that applies only to a subset of projects. Presenting it as a general phenomenon across all redevelopment is misleading," he said. He added that if supply falls short in certain projects, the answer is targeted policy fixes, pointing to Seoul's own split-household housing initiative as one example of how institutional adjustments can expand the housing count.

Oh said the value of redevelopment and reconstruction goes beyond raw unit numbers. "Has the president ever visited Changsin-dong in Jongno-gu, which is slated for redevelopment? The steep terrain and deteriorated conditions make it difficult for elderly residents even to step outside," he said. He added that for residents living in aging, dangerous neighborhoods where fire trucks cannot even enter, redevelopment is not simply a real estate project — it is hope for a better life.

Oh said his deeper concern was not the president's views themselves but the market signal they send each time they become public. "People take it to mean that supply through redevelopment and reconstruction will become harder under this administration. That expectation stokes anxiety about whether to buy now, which unsettles the market further," he said.

He said the only way forward was for the president to acknowledge the supply effect of redevelopment projects. "If the administration keeps hiding the right answer and repeating the same tax-heavy policies that already proved wrong, the result will once again be failure," he said.