Land Transaction Permit Zones Return to Seoul Suburbs for Three Years

The Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport has re-designated 42.13 square kilometres of the Seoul metropolitan area as a land transaction permit zone for three years, from 3 November 2026 to 2 November 2029. The decision is published as Notice No. 2026-1362 in the Official Gazette (관보) No. 21350 of 29 October 2026. From the start date, anyone buying land or housing inside the listed districts must obtain permission from the local government before concluding a contract.

A narrow core carved out of the August designation

The notice adjusts and re-designates the permit zone originally established by Notice No. 2026-1079 of 13 August 2026, which had covered 503.82 square kilometres across all 25 districts of Seoul, eight districts and part of Jemulpo-gu in Incheon, and 23 cities and counties in Gyeonggi Province. That earlier designation ran only from 18 August to 31 December 2026, a stop-gap window.

The adjustment narrows the map to 42.13 square kilometres concentrated on districts where public housing projects are planned or under way. The ministry invokes Article 10 of the Act on Reporting and Using Real Estate Transaction Data (「부동산 거래신고 등에 관한 법률」) as the legal basis, and the notice is signed by the Minister of Land, Infrastructure and Transport.

The districts covered

The re-designated area, broken down as published in the gazette:

• Seoul, Songpa-gu: Bangi-dong 1.30 ㎢ and Ogeum-dong 1.50 ㎢.
• Uijeongbu, Gyeonggi Province: Howon-dong 10.72 ㎢ — the single largest block inside Seoul’s inner ring.
• Guri: Sano-dong 3.22 ㎢.
• Hanam: Gambuk-dong 2.51 ㎢, Gambil-dong 2.09 ㎢ and Misa-dong 2.57 ㎢, flagged in the notice as a planned public housing district and its surrounding area.
• Gimpo: Sau-dong 1.30 ㎢, plus 16.92 ㎢ covering Singok-ri, Tae-ri, Punggok-ri and Hyangsan-ri in Gocheon-eup.

The Gimpo block alone accounts for roughly 40 per cent of the total surface re-designated.

What buyers must do, and where to check

Permission is required above fixed floor areas, unchanged from the earlier notice:

• Urban areas: residential zones over 60 ㎡, commercial and industrial zones over 150 ㎡, green belts over 200 ㎡, and undesignated zones over 60 ㎡.
• Outside urban areas: farmland over 500 ㎡, forest over 1,000 ㎡, and other land over 250 ㎡.

The land register for the adjusted zone is posted on the ministry’s website, under News > Notices > land transaction permit zone adjustment. The ministry cautions that the register was compiled before publication and may not reflect later land movements or corrections, so the final boundary maps prevail. Parcel-level detail is also available through the Land e-Eum service (www.eum.go.kr). Five boundary maps for the planned public housing district are annexed to the notice.

Relevance for residents and investors

For households in Bangi-dong, Ogeum-dong, Howon-dong, Sano-dong, Gambil-dong, Misa-dong and Gocheon-eup, the practical effect is a return to the pre-contract approval regime: a purchase agreement signed without permission is exposed to invalidity and administrative sanction. The three-year horizon also replaces the four-and-a-half-month window set in August, giving landowners and builders a clear planning period through November 2029 rather than an end-of-year cliff edge.

Source: 관보 (Official Gazette of the Republic of Korea), No. 21350 (별권1권), 29 October 2026, 공고 (Notices), p. 2 (official reference: 국토교통부공고 제2026-1362호).