Home Financing and its Debt Load of Home-owning Households in korea

권역별 주택금융부채 실태

It's well known that housing is one of the largest holdings in household wealth and at the same time the majority of households highly concentrate on it for their wealth accumulation. Coupled with a low interest rate and increasing housing price, the rationale is conspicuous and the propensity to debt-financed consumption becomes strengthened. This research was to examine the risk of home financing. In doing so, the study utilized several secondary data to identify the characteristics of households who finance loans for home buying in three regions of the nation - so-called Bubble 7, Seoul Metropolitan Area, and others. Based on the 2009 KB survey, the major findings were as follows: the majority of the studied households in Seoul Metropolitan Area who owned a house lived in rental housing, housing accounted for 89% of the household wealth, and home loans taken on were a ballon payment amortized for a short-term period (5 years) with an adjustable interest rate. In addition, the payment method most of the households depend on is income. The financing mechanism fueled debt load of the households, and further they are financially very vulnerable to such factors as increase in interest rate, unemployment and market downturn. In the absence of understanding the financial system, the consumption behavior leads to house-poor, so that financial accountability and ethics are addressed while the intervention of the government in home financing system should be more cautious but stimulate financial soundness in household wealth accumulation.