Residential Satisfaction Among Public Housing Residents Living in Social-Mix Housing Complexes: The Case of the Seoul Metropolitan Area, Korea

Abstract

This study asks how a social mix policy that mixes public housing with private housing in the same housing complex is associated with residential satisfaction among public housing residents in Korea. We also ask if mixture types between public and private housing make a difference in the residential satisfaction of public housing residents. By analyzing the 2011 Korea Housing Survey for Public Housing Residents, we find that living in the independent type that includes only public housing and the random-mix type that randomly mixes public housing with private housing in the same building is positively related to residential satisfaction among public housing residents. The empirical analysis also shows that the levels of social conflict among residents are the lowest in the random-mix type.

本文探讨韩国在同一居住小区中同时容纳公租房和私有住房的社会混合政策是否以及如何提高公租房住户的居住满意度。作者分析了2011 年韩国公租房住户住房调查，发现独立类——即仅有公租房，或同幢建筑内公租房与私有住房随机混住——与公租房住户的居住满意度呈正相关。实证分析也表明随机混住状态下住户的社会冲突水平最低。

Keywords:

• Social mix
• residential satisfaction
• public housing
• housing complex

Notes

1. Jeonse is a unique housing rental system. Under a Jeonse contract, a tenant pays a large (about 50–70% of home price) upfront deposit in the beginning of the contract term and does not pay monthly rents during the contract term (usually two years).

2. Since 2003, two types of public housing, purchased rental housing and leased rental housing that purchase low-rise semi-detached housing in the inner-city and rent at a lower cost have been provided for low-income families. These types of public housing can be effective for social mix because public housing residents living in existing low-rise housing units are less likely to be distinguishable from private housing residents (MLTMA 2011). However, the government needs to deal with the financial burdens of providing such public housing because using existing low-rise housing does not promote economies of scale and thus is expensive.

3. These rules have been changed in recent years due to the economic recession, which increased development pressures. In 2014, the rule for a new development project was changed to allow providing only 20% dwelling units as public housing. In 2015, the rule for a redevelopment project was changed to allow each locality to determine the ratio of redevelopment rental housing.

4. According to the 2011 Korea Housing Survey for Public Housing (MLTMA 2012), public housing in social-mix housing complexes accounts for 11.5% while public housing in the independent type housing complexes and non-housing complexes accounts for 83.0% and 5.5%, respectively. Among public housing in social-mix housing complexes, the type of public housing making up the largest share is the random-mix type (39.8%), which is followed by the complex-mix (27.2%), block-mix (22.1%), and line-mix (11.0%) types. Given that social exclusion about public housing residents are less likely to occur when public housing residents are mixed in the same buildings with private housing residents, random-mix and line-mix types of public housing have been promoted by governments (Chun 2012).

5. These variables were also on a 4-point Likert scale like the dependent variable.

6. We did not include the types of public housing such as permanent rental housing and national rental housing in the empirical model. This is because family type and household income that are included as independent variables are correlated with the type of public housing. For example, permanent rental housing is for the least affluent households while national rental housing is for higher-income households that earn 70% of the average household income. In addition, we cannot control for the size of housing complex due to the limitation of the data-set. Studies generally find that the size of housing complex is positively related to residential satisfaction and housing prices in Korea (e.g. Choi 2004, Jin and Son 2005, Won et al. 2009) because a large-sized housing complex can provide more amenities (e.g., parks and schools) thanks to economies of scale and thus is preferred over a small-sized housing complex.

7. Given that some studies find a non-linear relationship between age and residential satisfaction (Waziri et al. 2014), we included a squared term of the age variable in the model. However, the squared term was not statistically significant and thus was not included in the final model.