Korean people used to think that a house was an asset they had to own. The trend towards ownership has changed and they now consider houses as places where they reside. In addition, the type of rent has also changed from Jeonse, deposit-secured long-t...
Korean people used to think that a house was an asset they had to own. The trend towards ownership has changed and they now consider houses as places where they reside. In addition, the type of rent has also changed from Jeonse, deposit-secured long-term lease, to a monthly rent, resulting in a structural change in the market. As such, the interest in and demands for rental housing are expected to continue to increase in the coming years. A state of stagnation in the economic growth has been prolonged, and rental housing supply from the public sector such as Korea Land and Housing Corporation (LH) has reached its limit. As a result, the government has implemented a policy to increase the supply of rental housing via Real Estate Investment Trusts (hereafter refer to as REITs) since 2014 as part of a new rental housing supply system.
The key of the government's policy for the increase of the rental housing supply in the private sector is to vitalize the public-funded private rental REITs who provide the rental housing. To that end, providing incentives to the private sector partners who can expect a certain level of expected rate of return by actively investing in the project is considered important.
This study describes an empirical analysis on the factors affecting the expected rate of return for private businesses who invest in the public-funded private rental REITs. In order to conduct this analysis, the factors in terms of REITs, finance, and the apartment complex and region were considered. Multiple regression analyses were conducted on 57 public-funded private rental REITs. These REITs obtained the approval from Korea Housing & Urban Guarantee Corporation (HUG) to get the National Housing Urban Fund (NHUF) investment during the period from May 2014 to December 2018.
The result indicates that the following factors affected the expected rate of return for private businesses investing in the public-funded private rental REITs. The factors regarding REITs are shares of the private sector, constructor’s credit rating (A or higher). For finance, project cost, fund investment rate, the secure rate of capital gain are the factors. With regard to the apartment complex and region, the factors are rental rate compared to the market price in the surrounding area, size of the apartment complex. According to the additional analysis conducted by pooling significant variables from REITs finance, and, apartment complex and region, constructor’s credit rating (A or higher), fund investment rate, and the secure rate of capital gain affected the expected rate of return.
Since the study was conducted with all projects of the public-funded private rental REITs submitted to Korea Housing & Urban Guarantee Corporation from May 2014 to December 2018, it has significance as the very first study with its high credibility and accuracy. However, it demands continuous research because of the small sample analyzed (57) with the short history of the REITs policy being implemented and potential gaps between the expected rate of return and the actual rate of return after the completion of the project.