Living on the edge: financing post-displacement housing in urban redevelopment projects in Seoul

Abstract

This paper examines the displacement experiences of urban poor tenants in Seoul, South Korea, and the constraints on their financing of post-displacement housing. Since the mid-1980s, urban renewal of slums and dilapidated neighbourhoods in Seoul has been geared towards clearance and wholesale redevelopment. This approach is accompanied by legalization of land tenure for dwelling owners without de jure property rights, and is based on profit-led partnerships between property owners (both on-site dwelling owners and absentee landlords) and developers. Since the end of the 1980s, tenants have been given the option, if eligible, of in-kind compensation (access to a public rental flat) or cash compensation. Neither choice, however, reflects the needs of poor tenants who still find it difficult to finance inevitably increased housing expenditures. Policy measures are necessary to increase the range of options available to tenants upon displacement.