The number of apartment house in Korea (December, 2003) reaches at 6.4 million, which is more than half the number of total houses stocks, 12.36 million. At the end of 2002, a rate of housing supply already surpassed 100％. Also, the number of apartment house residents reached 27 million, which is more than half the number of total population in Korea. Responsively, the Ministry of Construction and Transportation, the government office in charge, declared to change the housing management policy from existing supply-centered policy to management-enhanced policy after the enactment of housing law.
As the average number of house holds who share a same building bigger than the former elementary buildings increases, the community culture became more individual-oriented, rather than the one based on mutual communication, which is becoming an issue. So far politically, the government has mainly concerned with the distribution of houses and far less with the management of existing houses. As a result, the problems and systematic errors from managing those buildings have become major national issues. Under the premises of the very shoe durability of Korean apartment buildings compared to that of other advanced country's and the advent of new community culture which divert from traditional Korean culture, this paper shows reasonable and efficient ways to improve these conditions.
So far, the construction industries have put more emphasis on the solution of housing shortages as a result, apartment buildings are becoming obsolete even before 20 years of their construction and are being questioned about their durability, capability, and safety.
Those houses cannot be regarded as fully functioning dwellings. And this is a considerable loss in national economy. Even in some cases, officers intentionally report false information to meet requisites for reconstruction. So improving the durability of houses has become a very significant problem awaiting solution for national economy.
Therefore, and as the rate of supply housing exceeds 100％ presently, it can be said that it is time for us to put more effort on managing existing residences than on housing problem. The government already abolished previous supply-oriented 'Housing Construction Promotion Act' at May 29, 2005 and started new management-oriented 'Housing Act' from November 2004.
In reality, however, there are still many problems. Inefficient audit systems and white-collar crimes and corruption influenced by disparity between resident-representative committee and the subject of the management still have not been systematically improved, resulting in disbelief between resident-representative committee and the subject of the management. Also, immoral and sporadic conflicts are being repeated.
Moreover, the national government and local governments are showing bystander's attitudes, insisting apartment buildings are private properties.
So in this paper, I tried to prove a way of systematic improvement to decrease these kinds of problems. First, I tried to find a reasonable and systematic solution by examining systematical and legal sides of apartment management and each part of management, that is, administration management, maintenance management, community management and finally . property management which supports to maintain the monetary value of the whole apartment development by various techniques.
So the purpose of this paper is to find a long-term and systematic solution that will lead us to safe longevity of residences and more pleasant communal life. rind it is expected that this procedure will activate local governments of community and inspire humanity and affection among residents. In turn, active participation of residents in their community, with movement of the community consciousness, will build a local self-administering culture.
When apartment building fails to meet its expected life, it becomes a heavy damage to national economy, that in return harms each citizen.
Not only the physical longevity of a residence, but also the mental union among its residents and advertisement have grown into questions of the same importance.
Therefore, an introduction of new paradigm of a way to manage apartment house is desperately needed. What we need now is not the cold and rectangular concrete building but a happy and amiable mood inside it. To achieve this, we need the change of the way that we view the problem and innovative policies.
First, we should recognize the problem from both general and detailed perspectives: as a general aspect, legal sides of the system and for the detailed aspect, facilities maintenance management administration management, maintenance management, community management and property management.
Second, I explained my improvement proposal by from both general and detailed perspectives: as a general aspect, legal sides of the system and for the detailed aspect, facilities maintenance management administration management, maintenance management, community management and property management.
To analyze of problems with laws,
Laws including apartment house management are not organized and arranged in the statute; there are many problems applying the laws systematically. Therefore, we need to enact separate and organized apartment house management regulations to encourage flexible responses to the problems. Those regulations should fit into actual circumstances of apartment house development, and there also should be a methodical procedure so that everyone can follow the regulations without any problem. To improve apartment house manager's experience and "conventional" supervision, the government should regulate the requisite for establishment and management of a company and help to sustain its technical professionalism at the same level. It would prevent dumping on the management commission and enable the industry to be more capable and competent.
We should enlarge the range of compulsory management than it of present status so that we could also meet the demands for super high-rise apartment, and complex-type apartment and lease apartment buildings. And by limiting its authority to a certain range, resident-representative committee should not intrude the rights of subject of management. Resident-representative committee should show and elucidate its whole process and assembly records so that the committee could be more democratized and with more transparency and organized system structure and experience.
And resident-representative committee should be able to represent opinions of all the members of the group not just of powerful minority by activating participation and emphasizing each member's responsibility in the group.
To improve the errors in the audit system, there should be a substantial audit system that could supervise both resident-representative committee and the subject of the management. In a present audit system, the subject of the management is supervised by an auditor hired by resident-representative committee, leaving resident-representative committee to supervise the subject of the management twice by themselves and by the auditor and no one to supervise resident-representative committee it self. the biggest problem is that there is no regulation against resident-representative committee even when the group exploits its power and make misleading decisions for its own self-interest. To remove this possible situation and to follow the principle of the diversion and balance, residents should select more than two auditors other than representative of each apartment building and give them the power to supervise resident-representative committee.
In this way, possible corruptions which can be originated from in choosing each service company to undertake the construction will be systematically reduced, promising proper transparency. Also, it will strengthen the trust between resident-representative committee and residents, motivating active communal activities.
To analyze problems in different departments in a management system,
First, administration management the subject of the management should distribute the standard of average management fee so that residents can compare their management fees to them of other apartment building developments and offer online website in order to deal with residents' complaints more flexibly and communicate with residents easily.
To prevent the most common corruption, which occurs when choosing undertaking companies such as painting, waterproof treatment and so forth there should be a certain and detailed procedure and standards selecting of a successful bider, audited and approved by committees, to motivate free-competitions among companies.
To promote the morale of the head of management and officers and to keep the structure within a group, there should be clear provisions about terms of office of the head of management like the one that arbitrary dismiss decision of head of management should only be made by direct vote from residents and that head of management should be able to work long-term so that he or she could get used to residents and facilities of the residence, which will increase the efficiency of his or her work.
Second, facility maintain management
By offering facility maintain management manuals and promoting house managing company's technical maintenance conditions, the subject of management has to support professionalizing facility management. And it also should introduce an increment in amount of guaranty money, improvement of an administrating system, and insurance systems to answer flexibly to any problems and to decrease the loss. And it should support to form a long-term repair plan and administer the collection of long-term repair expenses to be performed successfully.
Third, activation of community the subject of management should emphasize the importance of responsibilities imposed on residents and tenant residents to activate their communal activities. And it also should offer enough community facilities that could be served as a hardware or a place where those communal activities can be held.
And by using online mechanisms such as homepage and e-mail, the subject of the management should be able to communicate with its residents in various ways.
Fourth, property management.
A survey shows that both managers and residents has agreed that considering monetary value management concept of financial management by introducing business mind in every management activity rather than passive and management directed to restoration promotes a positive and progressive management. In the future, it would be an important field in apartment house management.
Therefore the subject of the management should struggle to change the management paradigm, and introduce business mind, by reducing management expense and making the best use of given budget.
Likewise, to improve present conditions of apartment house management, it is impossible to respond to every single problem; different systems should work in harmony so that they could ultimately produce a new driving momentum, a "synergy effect".
Performing efficient management tactics, the subject of the management should lengthen the longevity of apartment building, and offer residents a stable, systematic, and friendly apartment community.
This process is not possible by only one party but by the collaboration and the balance of power among the five different parties residents, resident-representative committee, auditor, the subject of the management, and the government. Among those five parties, major three parties are resident-representative committee, auditor, and the subject of the management this three-party structure is similar to that of a democratic country.
The most important systematic roles of among the roles of a concerned party of management for transparency, experience and utilization of management is to keep the equilibrium among their roles and to collaborate together to draw out the "synergy effect" that would ultimately run the system and keep the equilibrium automatically and efficiently.
Lastly, as much as the physical durability safety of facilities including apartment building itself, the mental union among residents is essential for the ideal apartment community to be established and this relationship will be eventually indivisible and mutual.