‘It’s just a late confirmation’…South Korea’s most popular rapper “home foreclosure for over a year in arrears of fines” bitterly argues

No. 1 on the official charts in 14 countries

It has been revealed that the very popular Korean rapper PSY (Psy, 46) has been having real estate troubles.

According to a report by the Korean media outlet Bizkoria on November 25, PSY has been in arrears of fines for over a year. As a result, his home was repossessed. Before introducing the trouble, we would like to look back at the popularity of Hallyu star PSY.

PSY is a world-renowned artist, having once reached No. 2 on the U.S. Billboard charts. His biggest hit is probably “Gangnam Style,” which was released in July ’12. The promotional video has been viewed more than 4 billion times.

The song became a worldwide hit, reaching No. 1 on the official charts in 14 countries, including the United Kingdom, Germany, and Belgium, and PSY was awarded the Order of Cultural Merit, the highest honor in Korean popular culture.

The real estate troubles began about 16 years ago.

In September 2008, PSY purchased several rooms in “The House,” a luxury villa in Hannam-dong, Yongsan-gu, a prime location in Seoul, and another building adjacent to it as his office. The purchase price was about 280 million yen. After living there with his family until around ’20, he moved to another residence and started offering it as a rental property.

Soon after, the Yongsan-gu Office received a complaint that “The House” had been expanded without permission; it seems that PSY had connected “The House” with the adjacent office and added a concrete wall inside the house. The Yongsan-gu Office confirmed the expansion and notified PSY to rectify the situation.

[Joon] Illegal additions were made during the initial construction.

However, PSY did not fulfill the corrective order. The district office imposed a performance fine, but the company failed to pay it for more than a year. As a result, his home was repossessed. According to the report mentioned at the beginning of this report, the fine was paid in October of this year and the foreclosure was lifted, but the expansion has still not been remedied. It is also known that during the period of arrears, PSY had purchased a mansion worth approximately 1.1 billion yen.

In response to the news report, PSY’s agency made the following bitter argument.

We are aware that there were illegal additions to the house (The House) when it was first constructed. The only reason why we failed to pay the performance sanction is because we were late in verifying the notices.

How could they have failed to check official notices for over a year? …… The laxity of Hallyu Star has been exposed.