President Lee Chae-kwang of the Korea Housing and Urban Guarantee Corp.(HUG). (Photo: HUG)

President Lee Chae-kwang said Korea Housing and Urban Guarantee Corp.(HUG) should be concerned mainly with numbers not so much with adjectives in its operation, which he mastered while serving for 24 years in the securities and financial industries fighting uncertainty in Yeouido, Seoul, since 1994.
He asked for an article with not much adjectives and adverbs centered on facts only as it is done in news paper articles. He said that’s just the style that HUG needs right now given the situation it is in.
Lee took over as the CEO of HUG in March, which issues the guarantees for most of the construction projects being undertaken around the country in addition to managing the 160 trillion won Urban Residential Fund for the government.
He held various important jobs during his long career including one as the acting fund management officer at Korea Pension Fund, director in charge of the asset management at Korea Development Bank, and director and head of the Research Center at Korea Investment Securities Co. to name some. It was the first interview with media in his career.
He thought the City Renovation New Deal, a key government policy, is a business for both opportunities and risks as it is the area that HUG never traveled before. But HUG will be responsible for any thing that has to with money including the analysis of risks associated with the projects before making investments and collection of the investments after the projects were completed. “We should be really be careful as we have to be an expert in diverse areas,” he said.
HUG has now been at work to develop a serious of new financial products that it can issued under the City Renovation Road Map announced by the government. “We are working on a number of new financial products right now tailor-made for the reuse of the closed schools and the renovation of the closed industrial complexes,” said the HUG CEO.
He also said HUG will develop guarantee products for shopping arcades for lease to cope with gentrification. For example, the government will provide financial support to the shopping arcades built on the closed school premises in the Urban Renovation Area that charge generous rents, which is called, “Generous Shopping Arcade Business.”
Lee also said HUG will also set up an exit strategy to collect the financial support provided to those shopping arcades after analyzing the associated risks as he was asked to comment on the plan to boost the number of civilian firms to set up shops in those Urban Renovation Fund project areas and the support to the social enterprises.
Lee has been stressing the use of numbers more at HUG because of the correctness that they have with the critical area of HUG businesses being the coming up with the possible chances and risks associated with the projects under consideration as HUG should be a public organization not easily shakable in the markets changing rapidly. We cannot defend against risks, he stressed.
A Shot in the Arm for Residents in Mansu-dong, Seoul
Korea Housing and Urban Guarantee Corp.(HUG) has given a shot in the arm to the residents of Mansu-dong No.1 Area in Incheon where many old residential houses are located and need funds to go ahead with various reconstruction projects to renovate those houses.
HUG extended support to the residents in the dilapidated area by giving them a 300 million won in loans at a very low interest rate of 1.5 percent per annum in October, last year. HUG, which has been managing the Urban Residential Fund for the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport, expanded the areas of its support to the projects for streamlining the residential houses along the streets from the houses for rentals and allocation for purchases. The Mansu-dong Area Project was the first one to benefit from the expanded fund support so that the area will be able to rebuild 27 dilapidated old houses into two apartment blocks with 89 individual apartment units.
Encouraged by the expanded fund support, a number of new housing redevelopment projects are being set up to take advantage of the fund. The area with two hundred old houses will be given the priority in getting the Urban Residential Fund in line with the Urban Renewal Promotion Road Map announced by the government in March.
HUG provided 1.2 billion won to the Samcholli Street Side Housing Renovation Project in Songnae-dong, Seoul, last year, which is to be launched as soon as it gets the license to kick off the project now that it got the funds it needs.
HUG President Lee Jae-kwang said HUG will expand the provision of the Urban Redevelopment Fund, along with the guarantees to positively support the government’s Urban Renewal New Deal Policy.