The ongoing construction of a five-story apartment. The outside walls are incomplete, and window frames are still not in place. October 2008 in Haeju City, South Hwanghae Province. Taken by Shim Ui-cheon (ASIAPRESS)
4-2 Housing prices
How much is the actual price of a house now? Since no related statistic has been published, I will base it on information ASIAPRESS has obtained from inside North Korea.
In the end of the 1990s luxury apartments in both Pyongyang and other major cities were called “10,000 dollars apartments.” The expansion of the market economy awarded some people a tremendous amount of cash by being able to sell their homes, something impossible under the previous planned economy. Apartments continue to increase in price ever since.
At the end of 2006, a resident in Chongjin City, the third biggest city, said in an interview, “In the case of a one-story house in an urban area, it should be near transportation and a market, have a stable power and water supply, and come with a large garden to cultivate vegetables and rear dogs or pigs. Tall apartments are not very attractive due to a lack of functioning elevators and a water supply because of an electricity shortage. In Chongjin City and Hamhung City, a single-story house with two rooms and a kitchen is sold at around 3,000 USD in the center of the city.”
Research Professor Jeong Eun-Yi, in the Institute for Social Science at the Gyeongsang National University in South Korea, conducted interviews with 20 North Korean defectors living in South Korea regarding the housing market. According to his research, the market prices for houses widely varied from 200 USD to 7,000 USD depending on location, the layout, and when they were built and sold on a market. Apartments in a big city, that are built for government officials, are expensive and the ones in rural areas were cheap.
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In 2014, an ASIAPRESS partner living in Hoeryong City, North Hamkyung Province reported that, “In the countryside near Hoeryong City, an ordinary detached house occupying 231 square meters including a garden, could be priced at 20 million Won (around 2,500 USD). The market price of an apartment is almost the same. However, if there are flaws like inconvenient traffic in the location, incomplete infrastructure, the lack of a floor heating system, and the need for further construction, a 132 – 165 square meter house can cost around 8 million Won. A clean single-story house in a rural area, far away from Hoeryong City that can accommodate two families with 165 square meters was 5 million Won. A 231 square meter house near a market, although access is inconvenient due to being a long distance from a city, was sold at around 15 million Won.”
[Note: As of early March 2013, 10,000 Won is equal to 1.25 USD based on my research.]In housing transactions, USD and Chinese RMB are used in North Korea except rural areas where North Korean Won payment is sometimes used.
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