Gwanak-gu in Seoul: typical rent and deposit for small homes

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We looked at 3,270 new monthly-rent contracts (wolse) for small homes in Gwanak-gu (관악구). Here are the numbers in detail, plus where you can get free help. ━━━━━━━━━━ 💸 ₩500,000 rent + ₩10 million deposit The data comes from rental contracts reported to the Seoul city government (open data). It covers 3,270 new monthly-rent contracts (월세) for homes up to 40 m² in officetels, villas and multi-unit houses, signed between July 29, 2026 and October 23, 2026. Apartments are not included. Typically (median), the monthly rent is ₩500,000 (≈ $373). The middle half of contracts runs from ₩400,000 (≈ $298) to ₩650,000 (≈ $485). The typical deposit (median) is ₩10 million (≈ $7,460). We converted at 1 USD = 1340.47 KRW; the dollar values are rounded. 👉 For you: As a rough guide for a small home in Gwanak-gu: about ₩500,000 (≈ $373) rent and a ₩10 million (≈ $7,460) deposit (median values). The middle half of rents runs from ₩400,000 (≈ $298) to ₩650,000 (≈ $485). ━━━━━━━━━━ 🏠 Typical 20 m² in officetel, villa or house The typical size (median) is 20 m². The home types differ in their median values, especially the deposit. Multi-unit house (단독다가구): 2,273 contracts, median rent ₩500,000 (≈ $373), median deposit ₩10 million (≈ $7,460). Officetel (오피스텔): 590 contracts, median rent ₩600,000 (≈ $448), median deposit ₩20 million (≈ $14,920). Villa, meaning a small multi-family building (연립다세대): 407 contracts, median rent ₩500,000 (≈ $373), but a median deposit of ₩70 million (≈ $52,220). 👉 For you: Don't look only at the monthly rent: for villas, the median deposit of ₩70 million (≈ $52,220) is far higher than for multi-unit houses (₩10 million, ≈ $7,460). ━━━━━━━━━━ 📍 Cheapest area: Sillim-dong at ₩480,000 We compared the neighborhoods (dong) in Gwanak-gu that had at least 20 contracts. The cheapest is Sillim-dong (신림동), with a median rent of ₩480,000 (≈ $358). There were 1,776 contracts there. Bongcheon-dong (봉천동) follows with ₩520,000 (≈ $388) and 1,363 contracts. The difference between the two areas is ₩40,000 (≈ $30) a month in median values. 👉 For you: These are median values, so your home may differ. ━━━━━━━━━━ 🔑 Deposit: ₩5 to 30 million in the middle Korea has two types of rental: Jeonse (전세), where instead of monthly rent you put down a very large, refundable deposit, and monthly rent (월세, Wolse), which means a deposit plus rent. According to the Korea Herald, many foreigners find it hard to get a loan for a Jeonse deposit and therefore choose monthly rent. In the Seoul Survey 2024, 52.5% of the foreigners surveyed paid monthly rent, compared with 28% of all Seoul residents. In our contracts, the middle half of deposits runs from ₩5 million (≈ $3,730) to ₩30 million (≈ $22,380). With a deposit of up to ₩10 million (≈ $7,460), the median rent was ₩500,000 (≈ $373) (1,926 contracts). With a deposit of more than ₩10 million, it was also ₩500,000 (≈ $373) (1,344 contracts). For comparison, the Korea Herald reports a record for all of Seoul in August 2026: an average monthly rent of ₩675,000 (≈ $504) and an average deposit of ₩61.17 million (≈ $45,630) for multi-family housing (Korea Real Estate Board). That is a different data basis from our analysis of small homes in Gwanak-gu. 👉 For you: In these contracts, a higher deposit did not automatically mean a different median rent. With every offer, compare the deposit and the monthly rent. ━━━━━━━━━━ 🤝 Free rental advice against Jeonse fraud According to the Korea Herald, foreigners' most common problems are communicating with the landlord and getting the deposit back. The Seoul Global Center connects them with experts for this. The Seoul Foreign Residents Support Center in Yeongdeungpo (Daelim-dong, 대림동) offers free rental advice against Jeonse fraud on Mondays from 2 to 5 pm, with English-speaking agents (Korea Times). Contact: phone 2229-4900, email help@sfrc.seoul.kr, info at global.seoul.go.kr. Seoul also has "Global Real Estate Agencies": 293 agents who speak foreign languages, 219 of them English. Most are in Yongsan (54), Gangnam (32) and Seocho (31). The list is on the city's website. 👉 For you: The center advises getting help early, ideally before you sign. Check times and details in advance through the contact options above. ━━━━━━━━━━ 🔗 Sources Stadt Seoul – Open Data: Mietverträge (서울시 부동산 전월세가 정보) https://data.seoul.go.kr/dataList/OA-21276/S/1/datasetView.do Korea Herald via Asia News Network – Rising rents narrow housing choices for Seoul's foreign residents (01.10.2026) https://asianews.network/?p=305016 Korea Times – Seoul to combat home lease fraud with multilingual counseling (17.11.2024) https://www.koreatimes.co.kr/amp/southkorea/society/20241117/seoul-to-combat-home-lease-fraud-with-multilingual-counseling ━━━━━━━━━━ 💬 How did you find your home in Seoul, and what would you do differently about rent and deposit today? 📲 On Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/lebeninkorea_en/ 📸 Photos: tommao wang, Roméo A., Janice Kwong, Brother Yoon, Dmitry Kropachev, Marek Piwnicki, Marissa Lewis (Unsplash); Seoul Tourism Organization (KOGL Type 1)