The number of unsold homes nationwide came in at 58,299 at the end of October, down 2.5 percent from a month earlier, according to the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport.
The country's unsold houses began to grow from about 14,000 in late 2021 due to higher borrowing costs, but the number stayed downward for the eighth month amid a low supply of new homes.
The country's central bank had left its policy rate unchanged at 3.50 percent since January, after increasing it by 3.0 percentage points for the past one and a half years.
The number of unsold homes in the capital Seoul and its surrounding metropolitan area, in which about half of the country's population resides, slipped 4.5 percent from a month earlier to 7,327 at the end of October.
The number in other areas shrank 2.2 percent to 50,972 in the cited month.
For the first 10 months of this year, the number of housing permits was 273,918, down 36.0 percent compared with the same period of last year.
The number of housing starts tumbled 57.2 percent to 141,595 in the 10-month period across the country.
The number of home transactions came to 471,603 during the January-October period, up 4.8 percent from a year earlier.
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