Analysis of Housing Patterns with GIS in Seongbuk-gu, Seoul

In the Seongbuk-gu district of Seoul, the capital city of South Korea, there are seven universities located. This is the highest number in Seoul and as a result, many young people from various regions are gathering here. Due to the influx of population, housing shortages are naturally occurring. The background and purpose of this project is to divide Seongbuk-gu into different zones and analyze the correlation between housing prices and population.

There are 25 administrative districts in Seoul, which are called "gu" and are both dependent and independent on the Seoul in separate forms. As mentioned earlier, I will proceed with the project focusing on "Seongbuk-gu," located in the northeast of Seoul.

Under the "gu," there are sub-administrative districts called "dong." These areas also have an independent existence, but are more dependent on both the "gu" and Seoul. The existence of both administrative "dong" and legal "dong" in this context can be confusing for people. Simply put, administrative "dong" governs things that directly affect people, such as community centers and welfare services, while legal "dong" exists based on documents such as land transactions. The concept of "dong" that I am using here refers to the legal concept of "dong," as all housing transactions are based on this distinction

There are 39 "dong" in Seongbuk-gu, and the area of each district varies greatly. This is related to the expansion of the city, where newly expanded urban areas have a larger area than the original districts. The map shows the locations of each districts.

The 7 universities located in Seongbuk-gu are located as shown on the map below.

The population data for Seongbuk-gu is based on the "Resident Registration Population by Age and Region" statistics published by the Ministry of the Interior and Safety of South Korea.

The following map shows the population ratio of 20-30 year olds. Typically, university students in Korea study for about 5-6 years in bachelor course, and men have to serve in the military, so they graduate at around 30 years of age. This is the reason for choosing this age range. Ideally, it would be great to extract only the population data for university students, but this is not realistically available, so this was chosen as an alternative.

The data related to people's land transactions is based on the nationwide transaction data provided by the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport of South Korea. I sorted out the raw data from 8,000 transactions that occurred in Seongbuk-gu in 2022.

There are two concepts of rent in South Korea, "monthly rent" and "rent with deposit without monthly rent". Most young people prefer to live on a monthly rent basis. Therefore, I excluded 1) without monthly rent data, and 2) cases where the deposit amount was more than 100 million won($100,000). Additionally, 3) I only used data with an area of 20 square meters or less, based on the housing type of university students, which is a "one-room" apartment. Based on these criteria, I extracted 2,977 pieces of data that occurred in Seongbuk-gu, Seoul.

In Korea, the deposit serves to complement the monthly rent payment. Generally, as the deposit amount increases, the monthly payment decreases, and vice versa. The deposit is given to the landlord and returned at the end of the contract period. Areas with high deposit amounts are generally considered to have a certain standard of living, while areas with low deposit amounts are often intended for students or low-income individuals.

Generally, high rent prices are often associated with various conditions such as larger room sizes, proximity to transportation, and good living environments. However, in Korea, rental prices tend to be high mainly due to the proximity to universities.

In Korea, when looking for a place to live, the expression "1,000 with 50" is often used. This means that the deposit is "1,000만원" (=100,00,000 won, $10,000), and the monthly rent is "50만원" (=500,000 won, $500). Based on this expression, I adjusted the prices for each region to match a deposit of 10 million won.