Factors Contributing to Residential Vacancy and Some Approaches to Management in Gyeonggi Province, Korea

• Main Authors: Jeehyun Nam, Jiae Han, Changho Lee
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: MDPI AG 2016-04-01
• Series: Sustainability
• Subjects: vacant house; abandoned house; shrinking cities; urban stocks; utilization; Gyeonggi province; population
• Online Access: http://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/8/4/367

With the decrease in the demand for large-scale apartments as a result of an aging society and a decrease in population, there has been an increase in vacant houses due to a supply that exceeds the projected demands. As a method of urban regeneration in rural areas and activation of citizen communities, the utilization of vacant houses has become one of the ways to promote a new lifestyle, active movement for citizen participation, and business model for long-term revitalization. This study aims to uncover and examine the major causes and factors behind the upswing in vacant houses. We investigated the current state of vacant houses, the recent policies concerning them, and the types of vacant houses in Korea’s Gyeonggi province. We then categorized and analyzed the causes of houses being vacant, their types, and the methods of utilizing them under different local conditions in order to understand the efficient processes and strategies for their utilization. The results showed that an excess of building construction (especially recent construction permits), the number of recipients of the national basic livelihood scheme, and the number of elderly people showed the strongest correlation with vacant houses.