On the MBC current affairs program "PD Notebook," which aired on the night of the 2nd, various controversies surrounding Cha Ga Won and MC Mong were covered. Cha is the chairman of Wonheon Red Label and the CEO of Pike Group, a total real estate service company.
The program focused on Cha and MC Mong's alleged affair, gambling, embezzlement, and other allegations.
Among them, the scandal of A Villa, which was built by Cha's Pike Group, was also highlighted. Cha was accused of "inflating prices" by using celebrities as tenants in his luxury villa business and charging them more than three times the market rate. In January, entertainment media outlet The Fact reported, "Lee Seung Gi and Baek Hyun are living in a luxury villa in Hannam-dong, owned by OneHundred CEO Cha Ga Won, paying 10.5 billion won and 16 billion won in rent, respectively. This is double the highest price for a villa in Seoul. "As a result, Mr. Cha Gawon set the rental price of his villa much higher than the surrounding market value by bringing in celebrities who are related parties as renters, and Mr. Lee Seung Gi and Baek Hyun took out large loans of KRW 7 billion and KRW 10 billion, respectively," said Mr. Kim. "This is a clear indication that the market is not in favor of celebrity residences. This could have sent a signal to the market that the rental price of a celebrity residence is this much and the sale price is more than that," the report said.
"All four rooms are unsold," the PD Notebook crew said, "and the villa is still owned by Chairman Cha and his wife. Lee Seung-ki and Baekhyun are renting it out, but we found something strange in the property register. A large loan had been executed."
Appraiser Jo Jung-heon said, "It's not common to see this kind of register. I've never seen one before. If the borrowers were not celebrities like Lee Seung-ki or Baekhyun, I wonder if they would have made such a loan."
The 'PD Notebook' representative said, "The maximum amount of the existing bond was 3.6 billion won. But when we changed it to a celebrity charter loan, the loan size more than tripled. The lender was not a Seoul financial institution. It was Suhyup, located in Wando, Jeollanam-do," the report said. "We looked at the surrounding market, evaluated Baekhyun's income, and his ability to repay the interest," said a Suhyup official.
An official from the implementing company told PD Notebook, "(Chairman Cha Ga-won) couldn't sell any of the houses, so he asked me to buy them for 10 billion won. He lured me, but I didn't buy it. That (house price) is not even 5 billion won. I couldn't sell any of them," he said.
Lee Seung-ki's lawyer, Yoon Yong-seok, said, "The amount of the charter deposit that (Chairman Cha Ga-won) talked about when he initially invited me to sign the charter contract is higher than the amount of the charter deposit.
When I asked them why, they explained, 'We did an appraisal and it was worth 16 billion won,' which doesn't make sense in common sense."
Lee Seung Gi told the 'PD Notebook' crew, "(Chairman Cha Ga Won) said that his upstairs house was empty and that he wanted to live close to my wife and me, so he kept asking us to sublet it. I refused several times, but he complained that he had nowhere else to turn. He rushed us into a sublease and refused to confirm the exact amount of the sublease, saying that the appraisal would be delayed, and then demanded more than three times the amount of the sublease right after we moved in," the statement reads.
"He (Cha) said he would pay the interest on the loan until the end. However, since then, he hasn't been able to pay the interest on the loan that he promised, so it doesn't look like he has the money."
However, Cha claimed, "Until now, I have paid the interest of hundreds of millions of won a month for our artists for three years."
"I paid the interest and said, 'This is a 'reservation of sale', you (artists) have to work hard to earn money and prove your income to buy an apartment, and when you can pay the taxes, I will hand it over to you, and it's all agreed," Cha's lawyer said.
However, the producers of 'PD Notebook' said, "We checked and found that the interest on the loan was paid by the company, not by Chairman Cha Ga Won personally. Since a few months ago, the celebrity has been paying the interest himself."
Appraiser Jo Jung-heon said, "This is a tactic used by scammers in charter fraud cases. "It's a common tactic used by scammers in rental fraud cases. The tenant is very happy because the landlord is giving them a guarantee, a loan, and interest, and they don't have to put any of their own money into it, but they get scammed a lot when they go into such a house."
'PD Notebook' reported that Lee Seung Gi and Baek Hyun's move in actually led to publicity. Furthermore, Cha Ga Won said, "The price of the house actually went up. When I first announced that this villa was going for 20 billion won, everyone was like, 'That X went up,' or something like that. But what happened is that the rental price is actually starting at 10 billion won, so the surrounding market price is too high. The reason why it's cautious is that it's a sensitive time for real estate, and people will say, 'Oh, he raised the price of the house,'" he said.
Meanwhile, despite Lee Seung-ki's explanation, he hasn't escaped criticism. Netizens commented, "You're moving out without signing a rental contract?", "Does this make sense?", "The process of signing a rental contract is to sign a contract with a fixed rental amount, pay 10%, and then pay the balance on moving day, but what does it mean that you asked for the rental amount right after moving in?", "You're just moving in because you're begging to move in?", "Is it right for Lee Seung Gi to fall for an emotional appeal and do something like that?", "You're paying more than 10 billion of my money to move in because an acquaintance wants to move in?", "What kind of appeal do you accept to move?", "Cha Gawon paid the interest on that mortgage loan and inflated the rent, so the sale of that house was posted, so it's not even a rental scam, it's more like an accomplice," "If that's the case, you should sue for fraud," "It's not normal to move without a contract," "Doesn't make sense, who is going to rely on it, without any benefit, the market price is 3 times different, I also spend 10 billion to sublet it," "It's stupid," and other harsh criticisms.
Meanwhile, Lee Seung Gi has notified Chairman Cha Ga Won's OneHundredDead that he has terminated his exclusive contract, saying that he has not been paid. When asked about the scale of the damage caused by the 'PD Notebook' crew, he said, "I have not received payment for 'Singer Gain' appearances, performances, and events. It's difficult to reveal the specific amount of damage, but it's in the hundreds of millions of won."
About Lee Seung-gi
Lee Seung-gi is a South Korean singer, actor, host, and entertainer. He has numerous hit songs as a singer such as "Because You're My Woman", "Will You Marry Me", "Return" and "The Ordinary Man".