Private Real Estate Buying and Selling Gains More Official Recognition

​Private sales and ownership of real estate has been going on for some years now, but it never got much official recognition. According to New Focus International, that may be changing: 

The North Korean government has recently allowed the possession and sale of real estate for citizens, to a limited extent. 

​A New Focus correspondent inside North Korea reported through telephone: “Until now, the North Korean government had deemed the private purchase of land or real property as illegal. However, there has been an obvious increase recently in the number of construction companies building apartment blocks and so forth. It appears that the state has realised the limitations of the current legislation and are taking countermeasures. These include new rules relating to the boundaries of newly-constructed buildings, or where land can be bought, and the penalties, mainly confiscation, for exceeding those boundaries.”