Renting in Gwangjin-gu (Seoul): Rent, Deposit and Neighborhoods at a Glance

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We analyzed 2,011 reported monthly rent contracts for small homes in Gwangjin-gu (광진구). Here are the numbers on rent, deposit, housing types and neighborhoods, plus places to get help before you sign. ━━━━━━━━━━ 💸 Typical rent: ₩550,000 a month The data covers 2,011 new monthly rent contracts (월세, wolse) for small homes up to 40 m² in Gwangjin-gu. They were signed between 04.08.2026 and 30.10.2026. The data comes from the reported rental contracts of the City of Seoul (open data). Apartments are not included, only officetel, villa and house with several units. The typical monthly rent (median) is ₩550,000 (≈ $412). The middle half of the contracts falls between ₩400,000 (≈ $300) and ₩700,000 (≈ $524). The typical deposit (median) is ₩10 million (≈ $7,490). For the middle half, it ranges from ₩5 million (≈ $3,745) to ₩30 million (≈ $22,470). The median is the middle value: half of the contracts are below it, half are above it. Dollar values are rounded and converted at 1 USD = 1335.27 KRW. 👉 For you: The range is wide, especially for the deposit. Look closely at which deposit is being asked for in your offer, and don't rely on the median alone. ━━━━━━━━━━ 🏠 Housing types: officetel, villa, multi-unit house The typical floor area (median) is 22 m². The contracts split into three types: house with several units (단독다가구) with 1,320 contracts, villa (연립다세대, a small multi-family building) with 381, and officetel (오피스텔) with 310. For officetels, the median rent is ₩820,000 (≈ $614) and the median deposit is ₩10 million (≈ $7,490). For villas, it is ₩520,000 rent (≈ $389) and ₩40 million deposit (≈ $29,960). For houses with several units, the values are ₩550,000 rent (≈ $412) and ₩10 million deposit (≈ $7,490). 👉 For you: The housing type makes a clear difference to rent and deposit. So compare offers within the same type whenever you can. ━━━━━━━━━━ 📍 Neighborhoods: from ₩500,000 to ₩600,000 We compared the neighborhoods (dong) in Gwangjin-gu by median rent. Only neighborhoods with at least 20 contracts were included. The cheapest are Junggok-dong (중곡동) at ₩500,000 (≈ $374, 387 contracts) and Neung-dong (능동) at ₩520,000 (≈ $389, 116 contracts). The most expensive are Hwayang-dong (화양동) at ₩600,000 (≈ $449, 519 contracts) and Jayang-dong (자양동) at ₩580,000 (≈ $434, 427 contracts). 👉 For you: Between the cheapest and the most expensive neighborhood, the median rent differs by ₩100,000 (≈ $75). These figures are for small homes up to 40 m², without apartments. ━━━━━━━━━━ 🔑 Deposit vs. rent: What the data shows Korea has two types of rental. With jeonse (전세), you pay a very high, refundable deposit instead of monthly rent. With monthly rent (월세, wolse), you pay 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 lived on monthly rent. Among all Seoulites, it was 28%. In our data, the median rent for a deposit of up to ₩10 million was ₩600,000 (≈ $449, 1,256 contracts). For a deposit above ₩10 million, it was ₩500,000 (≈ $374, 755 contracts). So in this data, the median rent was lower with a higher deposit. For comparison, the Korea Herald reports a record average monthly rent for multi-family housing in Seoul in August 2026: ₩675,000 (≈ $506), with an average deposit of ₩61.17 million (≈ $45,810) (Korea Real Estate Board). This is an average for all of Seoul and can't be directly compared with our median values for Gwangjin-gu. 👉 For you: Work out both options for your budget: a lower deposit with the rent offered for it, and a higher deposit with the rent offered for it. ━━━━━━━━━━ 🤝 Help before you sign According to the Korea Herald, the most common problems for foreigners are communicating with the landlord and getting the deposit back. The Seoul Global Center connects people with experts for this. The Seoul Foreign Residents Support Center advises getting help early, ideally before you sign. The center in Yeongdeungpo (Daelim-dong) offers free rental advice against jeonse fraud on Mondays from 2 to 5 pm, with English-speaking agents. Contact: phone 2229-4900, email help@sfrc.seoul.kr, info at global.seoul.go.kr. This information comes from a Korea Times report dated 17.11.2024, so it's best to check the current hours beforehand. 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: Have the contract and deposit checked before you sign, for example through the free advice service or with an agent who speaks foreign languages (such as English). ━━━━━━━━━━ 🔗 Sources Stadt Seoul – Open Data: Mietverträge (서울시 부동산 전월세가 정보) https://data.seoul.go.kr/dataList/OA-21276/S/1/datasetView.do Korea Real Estate Board (R-ONE) – Wohnungspreis-Statistik September 2026 https://www.reb.or.kr/r-one/portal/bbs/rpt/searchBulletinPage.do?listSubCd=RPT02 ━━━━━━━━━━ 💬 How did you find your home in Seoul, and what would you do differently today about rent and deposit? 📲 On Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/lebeninkorea_en/ 📸 Photos: NK Lee, Marek Piwnicki, Marissa Lewis (Unsplash)