By Kim Jae-won
The tax agency plans to investigate property speculators who purchased land in PyeongChang, the host city for the 2018 Winter Olympics.
Realty dealers from Seoul and other big cities bought land in and around the town in Gangwon Province, which they resold at high prices after PyeongChang won the bid for the Games, according to the National Tax Service (NTS).
“We have a list of realtors who earned big profits through land speculation. We will examine whether they evaded income and corporation taxes,” said Kim Dae-ji, a director of the NTS.
The tax agency said some realtors established temporary corporations for speculation, only to shut them down after raking in huge profits to avoid paying taxes.
The NTS said it will freeze assets of companies that are found to have broken the law.
Prices of properties in PyeongChang and its neighboring areas have spiked nearly 50 percent after July 6, when the winning bid was announced.
“Properties near the Alpensia Resort are selling for 800,000 won to 900,000 won per 3.3 square meters, up from 500,000 won to 600,000 won before the announcement,” said Ma Seong-il, former head of the PyeongChang Realtors Association, who runs a realtor office in the region. Alpensia is located inside the main venue for the Winter Olympics.
Ma said nonresidents own 80 percent of properties in the town with plans to sell them sooner or later. “All of them want to sell their land. They have no intention to live here, but to exit with the money.”
He also criticized the so-called hit-and-run realtors from out of town for exaggerating prices then exiting with considerable short-term profits.
The realtors usually buy a large piece of land, and sell it in smaller portions at exorbitant prices, according to Ma. Some of them even deceive customers by selling unattractive land disguised as valuable property.
PyeongChang lost two previous bids, first to Vancouver for the 2010 Olympics and then to Sochi in Russia for the 2014 Games, but won a resounding victory over Munich and Annecy in an International Olympic Committee vote held in the South African port city of Durban on July 6.
It received a landslide 63 votes, while Munich got 25 and Annecy, seven.