Jeon Hyun-moo lives in apartment worth W6b but never picks up the tab, colleagues reveal

Fellow entertainers and junior announcers have come forward with stories about broadcaster Jeon Hyun-moo's legendary frugality — while singer Lee Chan-won, the youngest in the group, has drawn praise for often footing the bill at group dinners.

The revelations came Sunday on the KBS 2TV variety program "Sajangnim Gwineun Dangnaegwi" (Boss Has Donkey Ears), which featured announcer Eom Ji-in's workplace life alongside Sun Kim, Kim Jin-ung and Lee Sang-cheol.

Sun Kim told the group that in all his time working with Jeon on the show "Tokpawon 25si," he had never once seen Jeon pay for a group dinner.

Yang Jun-hyeok responded with a jeer: "You're on how many programs? Come on, treat everyone once in a while."

Sun Kim then added that it was Lee Chan-won — the youngest member of the cast — who occasionally picked up the tab.

Jeon laughed off the embarrassment, saying, "Chan-won has a lot of money. He's loaded."

But the revelations about Jeon's penny-pinching ways kept coming.

Eom Ji-in, who worked with Jeon during his time at KBS, said he had a real reputation for being tight with money. "He never bought anything for anyone — he just saved and saved everything," she said.

Faced with the string of exposés, Jeon finally came clean. "I saved and saved, and the place I loved most when I went on overseas shoots was the duty-free shop," he said. "I mostly bought cosmetics for my mother and my girlfriend at the time."

Meanwhile, the attention on Jeon's frugal reputation has also drawn curiosity about his home — an apartment in Samseong-dong, Gangnam-gu, Seoul. Jeon lives in a unit measuring about 195 square meters, with a market price of around 6 billion won ($4.24 million).