From neglected homes to actual transactions... Haenam's 'Vacant Home Bank' experiment [Mokpo MBC Newsdesk]

Due to aging and population migration, vacant homes are increasing across the region. The situation is even more severe in rural areas. Haenam County is creating positive changes in the area by facilitating actual transactions through its Vacant Home Bank project. This is Park Jong-ho reporting. In a rural village in Jeonnam, abandoned vacant homes are visible everywhere, having been empty for years. Doors are gone, and the yards are overgrown with weeds. Slate roofs, which would have been fixed if people lived there, are exposed. As vacant homes in old villages rapidly increase due to aging and population decline, they are becoming eyesores in the village. Because the vacant homes are left unattended, weeds grow in the summer, making the area an eyesore, and people dump trash where it's empty, causing significant blight and inconvenience to the village. To solve the increasingly serious vacant home problem, Haenam County's Vacant Home Bank project is showing tangible results. The first transaction was completed just a month after the project started, which supports everything from surveying the vacant home situation to connecting with brokerage experts. Recently, the first move-in was completed for a support project that involves demolishing a neglected vacant home and building a new one, accelerating the pace of vacant home revitalization. Haenam County hopes that by revitalizing rural vacant homes, transactions will become more active, leading to more people moving into Haenam County from outside or returning to farm/live here. As of 2024, there were over 134,000 vacant homes nationwide that had been unoccupied for over a year. Among these, Jeollanam-do had the most with over 20,000, followed by Jeollabuk-do, Gyeongsangnam-do, and Gyeongsangbuk-do. Due to practical limitations, local governments often cannot directly maintain abandoned vacant homes, so most are left neglected. As local governments and residents deeply ponder solutions for the vacant home issue, Haenam County's new attempt is drawing attention as another alternative. This is MBC News, Park Jong-woo.