Haebangchon, Seoul's most diverse neighborhood, faces uncertain future

Central Seoul's Yongsan-dong 2ga, also known as Haebangchon, Nov. 13, 2018. / Korea Times photo by Jon Dunbar

This article is the first part in a three-part series about the past, present and future of central Seoul's Haebangchon (HBC) neighborhood.

By Jon Dunbar

Once the sun goes down and city lights start to go on, it becomes apparent how few lights are on behind the windows of apartments lining Sinheung-ro, the main road running through central Seoul's Haebangchon (HBC) neighborhood. Gentrification is hitting this area, and many of its residents are worried.

"Since I came here, a lot of the places that I used to enjoy going to have either closed or gotten smaller," said Sarah Mack, an American resident of HBC. "These community spaces that people had been gathering at for years and years have been just disappearing overnight."

She estimated that since 2019 there have been about 40 to 50 changes in businesses along the lower 500 meters of Sinheung-ro where various businesses are concentrated.

Already this year, there have been numerous closures along the lower stretch of the road. The Workshop and Hidden Cellar closed abruptly, with no prior notice. Phillies left its original space, moving further up the street into the former Gogi Boys location. Adult lifestyle store Piooda closed and the building was torn down. Pocket, under the ownership of nearby Southside Parlor also closed.

Phillies in central Seoul's Haebangchon closes its door on its original location after 26 years, April 26. / Korea Times photo by Jon Dunbar

"I don't even really go to bars necessarily, but I also realized that to live in the community that I enjoy living in, those bars and those gathering spaces are such integral parts of that. Without places like Phillies, without places like the Workshop, a lot of the other stuff that I participate in more directly wouldn't exist around those spaces. The culture, the community around here, it kind of started out of those spaces. If that's the foundation of this whole community and even that's vulnerable to being taken over or the business failing or not being able to afford to stay in the area, then who the heck is gonna survive?"

It's not just foreign-run businesses, but also more established businesses serving an important niche in the community. The number of grocery stores on the street has been shrinking, while other businesses that serve the community are getting harder to find.

The lights are on and the door is open on one of the last nights of Woori Mart's operation in central Seoul's Haebangchon, Oct. 23, 2022. / Korea Times photo by Jon Dunbar

When storefronts close, it seems like these days they're either staying closed, being torn down or getting replaced by unmanned photo booths ― Sinheung-ro now has three of those and counting.

A Korean woman shows off photos she bought at an unmanned photo studio in central Seoul's Haebangchon, March 4. / Korea Times photo by Jon Dunbar

"I always say that it's like a small town down in the middle of a giant city," Mack said. "I honestly never expected to live here, let alone like it, but I have fallen in love with the area for its sense of community that I haven't felt anywhere else in Korea. I know my neighbors, Korean and non-Korean. There are a lot of international families that live there. Seeing kids with parents from opposite ends of the world chatting in Korean on their way to the bus warms my heart. A lot of the homeowners and their families have been there since the 1960s; "halmoni" (the Korean word used to refer to an elderly woman or grandmother) walk up and down those treacherous hills every day, nodding at their neighbors as they work on their rooftop gardens or gossip at the old hair salon down the street or pick up groceries from the local mart. HBC doesn't feel like just another part of Seoul or even the world ― if you woke up and found yourself in the area, one look at the tiled roofs, crane-engraved doors, cramp-inducing hills and notices posted in five different languages would tell you exactly where you are. It's probably one of the most diverse ― if not the most diverse ― residential neighborhoods in all of Korea."

HBC, known officially as Yongsan 2ga-dong, houses a sizeable foreign community. At last count, about 1,324 residents hailed from overseas or about 10 percent of the neighborhood's population. And it's a community that couldn't exist so easily elsewhere.

"HBC is a unique area in Seoul," Jee Kim, a realtor at I-chon Daerim Realty who focuses on Itaewon, Hannam-dong and HBC, told The Korea Times. "There are places nearby universities offering low rent and deposits but it is very different in terms of location (convenient to move around Seoul), size of the apartment offering (majority of apartments nearby universities are studio type or small-sized apartments) and understanding of the foreign community."

HBC offers an attractive housing market for foreigners with a steady income, but not much money saved up, as is natural with expats who didn't travel here with their life savings and are disadvantaged in being able to take out housing loans from local banks. A standard practice, in most parts of the country, just to be able to rent a property. In this neighborhood, the landlords don't ask for ridiculously high deposits on leases. They're also more flexible with lease durations, and are willing to rent to people who are only planning on staying in the country for half a year.

Haebangchon at night, April 17 / Korea Times photo by Jon Dunbar

Contrary to the signs of gentrification in the lower parts of Sinheung-ro, Kim presents a more optimistic view of the local residential housing market.

"It is quite stable at the moment for the residential market for those people who seek lower deposits and a reasonable rental price," she said. "One of the reasons why HBC has survived during gentrification of Gyeongnidan, COVID-19 and many other situations was because landlords maintained low rental prices. The current landlords know that and they tried not to raise the rent too much."

She cautioned that gentrification happens when ownership changes and both the current landlords, as well as many of the buildings, are aging.

"A large number of the buildings are in need of renovation or replacement. The landlords who have been fixing the properties and renting for reasonable prices are getting old and it will change naturally when new landlords enter the market," she said. "When the landlord changes and the new landlord thinks differently, HBC might be at risk of gentrification, too."

One of the narrow alleys of central Seoul's Haebangchon neighborhood, Nov. 13, 2018 / Korea Times photo by Jon Dunbar