HF to Prepare for Growing Uncertainty and Provide More Customized Housing Finance

On Jan. 3, HF donates 150 million won to the headquarters of the Green Umbrella Children’s Foundation in Seoul. Kim Kyung-hwan, president of HF (left) poses for a photo with Hwang Young-ki, chairman of the Green Umbrella Children’s Foundation. (Photo: HF)

In his New Year’s speech, Kim Kyung-hwan, president of Korea Housing Finance Corporation (HF) said the organization will prepare for internal and external shocks and provide housing finance that consumers need, despite the unstable political and economic situations in Korea.

The company will also develop innovative housing finance products tailored to the needs of consumers.

“Korea is politically and economically under stringent circumstances, where uncertainties such as interest rates and exchange rates are growing due to changes in external environments, such as a new administration in the United States and the Fed’s interest rate cuts,” Kim said in his New Year’s message on Jan. 31.

“HF will remain vigilant and keep an eye on domestic and foreign market trends to predict and prepare for various situations.”

In particular, Kim urged HF employees to check and prepare for sectors that are vulnerable to internal and external shocks, and pay attention to enterprise-wide risk management and financial soundness.

Specifically, Kim ordered them to strengthen their core competencies, including securing the core competitiveness of mortgage loans and upgrading the financial procurement system, improving the Jeonse guarantee and Jeonse deposit money return guarantee system, and promoting housing pensions.

“We must also continue to develop innovative housing finance products that respond to demographic and social structure changes, such as low birthrate and aging, climate change, and low growth,” Kim said.

“I hope that the HF’s housing finance research institute and overseas offices will play a pivotal role in housing finance research and international cooperation by strengthening domestic and international housing finance research capabilities.”

In addition, Kim vowed to review and execute everything from the perspective of financial consumers.

“This is the first year of a new leap forward under the new vision of Global HF,” Kim said.

“I ask HF employees to always think about policies from the perspective of financial consumers so that the HF employees will be able to provide services they need.”

Cutting Interest Rate on Its Long-Term, Fixed-Rate, Amortizing Mortgage Loan “Bomgeumjari Loan”

HF announced on Jan. 23 that it will cut the interest rate on its long-term, fixed-rate, amortizing mortgage loan “Bomgeumjari Loan” by 0.3 percentage points in February.

As a result, the interest rate will be 3.65 percent (10 years) to 3.95 percent (50 years) per annum for Aggim e-Bogeumjari Loan.

Low-income youths, marginalized groups (disabled people and single-parent families among others) and victims of charter fraud will receive additional preferential interest rates of up to 1.0 percentage point, resulting in interest rates as low as 2.65 (10 years) to 2.95 (50 years) per year.

“We lowered the interest rate on the mortgage loan to minimize interest burdens on ordinary people, reflecting the recent trend of the Bank of Korea lowering its benchmark interest rate and the downward stabilization of MBS procurement rates,” an HF official said.

Better Human Rights Management through Development of Index

HF announced on Jan. 16 that it will strengthen its human rights management through the development of the HF Human Rights Management Index and its quantitative evaluation.

The index was developed by HF’s Housing Finance Research Institute in 2024 after consultation with external experts to identify and improve the level of human rights management by quantifying HF’s human rights management performance.

HF calculates the HF Human Rights Management Index by evaluating human rights impact assessment results, human rights management efforts, human rights management experience and actual human rights violations, and then summing up the scores of each item.

In this evaluation, the HF Human Rights Management Index was rated “Excellent (S).”

In particular, HF completed the task of making efforts to finance and support vulnerable borrowers 100 percent in the human rights management efforts category.

“With the development of the index to measure the performances of human rights management, we will further strengthen our human rights management,” said Kim Kyung-hwan, president of the corporation.

“HF will play a leading role in spreading a culture of respect for human rights in the public sector.”

Meanwhile, HF has continued its human rights management efforts for internal and external stakeholders.