Seo Jang-hoon Listed a Seoul Building for 45 Billion Won. He Paid 2.8 Billion in 2000.

Former professional basketball player and TV personality Seo Jang-hoon has listed a commercial building in Seoul's Seocho district at an asking price of 45 billion won, real estate media outlet Jangjipgo reported on August 7. The property was registered on a real estate brokerage site last month at that figure, a striking contrast to the 2.817 billion won he paid for it at auction in 2000.

The building, known as Dabo Building, sits near Exit 2 of Yangjae Station, which is served by both subway Line 3 and the Shinbundang Line, making it one of the better-connected commercial addresses in southern Seoul. The structure runs from two basement floors to five above ground.

If the transaction closes at the listed price, Seo would realize a gain of roughly 42.2 billion won on an asset he has held for about 25 years. That kind of appreciation on a single Gangnam-adjacent commercial property is not unusual by the standards of Seoul's long real estate cycle, but the absolute numbers are significant enough to draw attention.

What gives the story a secondary angle is Seo's reputation as a landlord. He is widely known in South Korea for setting rents below the going market rate for the area, a practice that earned him the informal label of chak-han geonmul-ju, roughly translating to "good-natured building owner," a term that carries real cultural weight in a country where tenant-landlord tensions in commercial real estate are a persistent public grievance.

As recently as August 5, on the EBS program Seo Jang-hoon's Millionaire Next Door, he addressed the subject directly. Responding to the story of a small business owner who had received an eviction notice from their landlord, Seo said he had never once asked a tenant to leave on his own initiative. Whether the current listing changes that record, or whether the building will ultimately trade hands at all, remains to be seen.