Open Decision Ledger · Civil obligations & remedies
A colluded mortgage on rental housing as void
Supreme Court, Nov. 13, 2025, 2025Da210806 (judgment)
No holding summary · checked against points at issue. The official text publishes no summary of the holding for this decision. The quotation and factors in this record are copied verbatim from the points at issue; the evidence for each axis is taken from the points at issue, the order and the reasons.
Case name: 소유권이전등기
Official text on the National Law Information Center
Question
Was a mortgage registered on public rental housing before conversion, contrary to Article 18(1) of the former Rental Housing Act, automatically void, or void as an act against good morals and social order where the operator and the lenders colluded to breach that prohibitory provision?
Holding
Article 18(1) of the former Rental Housing Act is only a prohibitory provision, so a transaction made in breach of it is not void automatically. Where the parties colluded to make such a transaction, however, it is void as an act against good morals and other social order under Article 103 of the Civil Code. On these facts, the operator and the lenders were likely to have colluded to register the mortgages in breach of that provision, so the court below erred in rejecting the claim without examining what it needed to, and the judgment was reversed and remanded.
Points at issue, verbatim
당사자가 통정하여 위와 같은 단속규정을 위반하는 법률행위를 한 경우, 선량한 풍속 기타 사회질서에 반하는 법률행위로서 무효인지 여부(적극)
Unofficial English translation
Where the parties, in collusion, make a juristic act that violates such a police regulation, whether it is void as a juristic act contrary to good morals and other social order (affirmative)
Disposition
Reversed and remanded Stated in the decision
원심판결을 파기하고, 사건을 광주고등법원에 환송한다.
Unofficial English translation
The judgment of the court below is reversed, and the case is remanded to the Gwangju High Court.
Form of the test
Existing test applied Read from the decision
원심공동피고와 피고들이 통정하여 단속규정인 구 임대주택법 제18조 제1항을 위반하는 이 사건 근저당권 설정행위를 하였다고 볼 여지가 크다.
Unofficial English translation
There is much room to regard the co-defendant in the court below and the defendants as having acted in collusion to commit the act of creating the maximum amount mortgage in this case, in violation of paragraph (1) of Article 18 of the former Rental Housing Act, which is a police regulation.
Factors
- 구 임대주택법 제18조의 규정 취지
- 구 임대주택법 제18조 제1항의 법적 성질(=단속규정) 및 이를 위반한 법률행위가 당연 무효인지 여부(소극)
- 당사자가 통정하여 위와 같은 단속규정을 위반하는 법률행위를 한 경우, 선량한 풍속 기타 사회질서에 반하는 법률행위로서 무효인지 여부(적극)
Unofficial English translation
• The purpose of Article 18 of the former Rental Housing Act
• The legal nature of paragraph (1) of Article 18 of the former Rental Housing Act (= a police regulation) and whether a juristic act violating it is automatically void (negative)
• Where the parties, in collusion, make a juristic act that violates such a police regulation, whether it is void as a juristic act contrary to good morals and other social order (affirmative)
Relation to precedent
Follows earlier decisions Stated in the decision
대법원 2006. 12. 7. 선고 2006다49796 판결
Unofficial English translation
Supreme Court Decision 2006Da49796 decided December 7, 2006
Decisions referred to
대법원 2006. 12. 7. 선고 2006다49796 판결, 대법원 2024. 7. 25. 선고 2022다204333 판결(공2024하, 1463)
Burden of proof
Not addressed Not in the decision
Open question and revisit condition
Where the operator alone delays the prohibition registration and the lenders register without knowing of it, can the mortgage still be void under Article 103 of the Civil Code?
A remand judgment finding or rejecting the collusion on this record will show how the timing gap and the lenders' documents are weighed. A change to Article 18 of the former Rental Housing Act, now deleted and replaced by the Act on Special Cases concerning Private Rental Housing, or a later Supreme Court decision on that replacement, would require this entry to be read again.
Cross-family AI independent reading & axis check
6 of 8 axes matched GPT-6 Astra (OpenAI, codex CLI) · 2026-10-24
A reader from another model family (GPT-6 Astra), given the official text but not the primary reading, agreed on 6 of the 8 axes; the readings differed on axis 4 (form of the test), axis 8 (open question and revisit condition).
Axis 4 (Form of the test): Primary “Existing test applied” vs Independent “Elements stated”
The primary emphasizes application to the mortgage transaction, while the independent emphasizes the invalidity requirements stated in the issues, which can explain the different classifications despite the absent holding text.
당사자가 통정하여 위와 같은 단속규정을 위반하는 법률행위를 한 경우, 선량한 풍속 기타 사회질서에 반하는 법률행위로서 무효인지 여부(적극)Axis 8 (Open question and revisit condition): Primary “Where the operator alone delays the prohibition registration and the lenders register without knowing of it, can the mortgage still be void under Article 103 of the Civil Code?” vs Independent “Will further examination on remand establish collusion sufficient to invalidate the mortgages and require cancellation of their registrations?”
The primary asks about invalidity when lenders lack knowledge, while the independent asks whether collusion will be established on remand.
당사자가 통정하여 위와 같은 단속규정을 위반하는 법률행위를 한 경우, 선량한 풍속 기타 사회질서에 반하는 법률행위로서 무효인지 여부(적극)Raw responses and comparison record: Protocol · Blind readings (JSONL) · Axis comparison (JSONL) · SHA-256 (JSON)
Lower-court contrast & scope of application
Lower-court reading vs. Supreme Court holding
Lower-court context: The Gwangju High Court, in its judgment of 13 February 2025 (2023Na26034, 26041), held that the cancellation of the earlier prohibition registration was lawful and that the lenders' intention to evade Article 18 of the former Rental Housing Act could not be established, and on that basis held that the mortgages were not an act contrary to social order. It rejected the plaintiffs' argument that the mortgages were void as contrary to social order, and the decision does not state the form of its disposition of the cancellation claim.
Supreme Court standard: The Supreme Court held that the court below had misread the law on the validity of acts breaching Article 18(1) and had not made the necessary examination. The record showed a long-term, low-interest fund loan replaced by a 12-month, 5% savings bank loan with a higher maximum claim amount, a deliberate delay in registering the prohibition notice that created the gap in which the mortgages were registered, and active co-operation in that registration, so the parties were likely to have colluded. It reversed the whole judgment and remanded the case to the Gwangju High Court.
Distinguishing conditions
- A restriction in favour of the Urban Housing Fund, which the earlier registration allowed as an exception, since the Court treated that security interest as not caught by the prohibition.
- A mortgage entered into by one party alone without the collusion of the operator and the lenders, since the Court rested the invalidity on their concerted act.
- A security interest created after conversion was approved, or on housing outside the former Rental Housing Act, since the prohibition runs until conversion of public rental housing built with fund money.
Record verification notes
Set each mortgage against the loan terms on both sides: the fund loan's maturity of 30 November 2042 and 2% interest against the new loan's 12-month maturity and 5% interest, and the rise in the maximum claim amount, since the Court reasoned from the added risk to the tenants. Then check whether the earlier prohibition registration had been entered against each unit, whether the transfer and the new prohibition registration were applied for together, and what the lenders' internal appraisals and approval documents recorded.
From the official text
Points at issue
구 임대주택법 제18조의 규정 취지 / 구 임대주택법 제18조 제1항의 법적 성질(=단속규정) 및 이를 위반한 법률행위가 당연 무효인지 여부(소극) / 당사자가 통정하여 위와 같은 단속규정을 위반하는 법률행위를 한 경우, 선량한 풍속 기타 사회질서에 반하는 법률행위로서 무효인지 여부(적극)
Unofficial English translation
The purpose of Article 18 of the former Rental Housing Act / The legal nature of paragraph (1) of Article 18 of the former Rental Housing Act (= a police regulation) and whether a juristic act violating it is automatically void (negative) / Where the parties, in collusion, make a juristic act that violates such a police regulation, whether it is void as a juristic act contrary to good morals and other social order (affirmative)
Summary of the holding
The official text publishes no summary of the holding for this decision. The quotation and factors in this record are copied verbatim from the points at issue; the evidence for each axis is taken from the points at issue, the order and the reasons.
Order
원심판결을 파기하고, 사건을 광주고등법원에 환송한다.
Unofficial English translation
The judgment of the court below is reversed, and the case is remanded to the Gwangju High Court.
Provisions referred to
구 임대주택법(2015. 8. 28. 법률 제13499호 민간임대주택에 관한 특별법으로 전부 개정되기 전의 것) 제18조(현행 삭제), 민법 제103조, 제105조
Read 2026-10-24 · Cross-read 2026-10-24. All quotes matched against the official text. The Chinese-character placeholders the court used for anonymised parties are given in their Korean readings, and parenthetical Chinese-character glosses are omitted.
Every entry is published only after all quotes have been matched character by character against the official text, and audited by an independent second reading from a different model family across all eight axes. Both agreed axes and text-grounded interpretive divergences are recorded openly. The ledger is a research record, not an assessment of the court or advice on any matter.
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