Ministry says land prices rose 3.64% over 2013

Real estate prices rose an average of 3.64 percent as of Jan. 1 compared to a year earlier owing to a number of planned development projects across the nation, the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport announced yesterday.

The increase was the largest since 2009.

According to the ministry’s report on 500,000 lots of land selected by the government out of 31.58 million lots to measure prices, there has been a gradual price increase since 2010 after a 4 percent decline in 2009 due to the impact of the global financial crisis.

Land prices in Sejong City, the new home to many government ministries and agencies, jumped 18.12 percent year-on-year, the biggest increase.

“Along with a recovering real estate market, development projects in Sejong and other cities resulted in land price increases across the nation,” said an official at the ministry.

Prices in the Seoul metropolitan area rose 3.11 percent. Other metropolitan cities like Busan and Daejeon climbed an average of 4.77 percent. Other cities and counties went up 5.33 percent on average.

By city, Ulsan surged 9.71 percent, second to Sejong. Development of Ulsan’s Ujeong Innovation City caused prices to shoot up.

By province, South Gyeongsang climbed 6.88 percent, North Gyeongsang 6.62 percent and South Jeolla 5.22 percent, hovering above the national average, data showed.

The report said certain smaller cities and counties in provincial areas showed bigger increases in land prices than the Seoul metropolitan areas, owing to development projects.

In North Gyeongsang, creation of a marine theme park is planned in Geoje and an industrial complex in Haman. In South Jeolla, construction of Naju Innovation City, Songlim’s green tech complex in Yeonggwang and designation of an economic free zone in Gwangyang affected land prices, the ministry said.

BY SONG SU-HYUN [ssh@joongang.co.kr]