The Physician of Traditional Medicine Returns from Murim

Submit a dividend claim application?

What on earth does this mean?

I read the documents from the court several times, but I couldn’t make heads or tails of it.

Well, of course I can read it since it’s written in Korean.

But it’s like those martial arts manuals written entirely in Chinese characters that I know – I just can’t understand them. That’s what I mean.

With all the legal jargon, I couldn’t be sure if my understanding was correct.

“Sang-hoon-oppa, do you have a moment? You too, In-ae-ssaem?”

“What’s up?”

“Yes?”

I hadn’t fully grasped the situation myself, so hearing it might confuse the employees.

I called Hwang Sang-hoon and Seo In-ae to the consultation room separately.

They seemed like people who might know more about real estate or auctions than I do.

“Is there some kind of problem…”

Although Hwang Sang-hoon occasionally comes to ask questions, it’s extremely rare for me to summon him first, so he looked quite tense.

And with Seo In-ae, of all people?

“Can both of you read this for me?”

“Hm?”

“…An auction? This building?”

Seo In-ae’s face contorted as she carelessly picked up the document.

“Yeowon, how much of a deposit is tied up here?”

Hwang Sang-hoon asked urgently.

Oh, they understood the situation just from the document title. As expected, they’re better than me at something, at least.

“The deposit isn’t much. It’s 80 million won for 1,000 here.”

“Director, what about the key money?”

“There wasn’t any. Free transfer.”

“Ah, that’s a relief!”

“You didn’t do any interior work separately, right?”

“No.”

Both of them simultaneously sighed in relief when I said there was no key money.

“What does key money have to do with anything?”

“Well, if there’s a senior mortgage, it doesn’t have any opposing power…”

I scratched my head, understanding nothing, while Hwang Sang-hoon spouted alien language no different from what was written in the documents.

Opposing power? Is that like Diamond Body or something?

Seeing my expression turn strange, Seo In-ae opened her mouth.

“Let me explain from the beginning. First, the fact that the building has gone to auction means someone applied to seize the property because they couldn’t get money they were supposed to receive from the building owner. Do you understand this far?”

“Yes. I’ve heard that buying at auction is much cheaper from a buyer’s perspective. If they could sell it normally, they could sell it for more, so this means they’re almost bankrupt, right?”

“That’s right.”

Even before calling these two, I had looked it up on the internet and understood what an auction was.

“Looking at the real estate register, the problem with this building is bank loans. See here. There’s a loan of 600 million won, and 30 million won in unpaid taxes, right?”

“Ah, yes.”

“If you look at the order, the building owner took out the loan first, and you entered as a tenant the following year. This means the bank has the right to receive money before you. If the auction bid reaches, say, 1 billion won, the bank takes their share, the tax office gets their unpaid taxes, and then it’s the tenants’ turn, but if it’s only 500 million won, we’re in trouble.”

“Ah!”

…So depending on the winning bid amount, I could lose 10 million won?

To be honest, it’s not a huge amount compared to current income, but I couldn’t help feeling sick to my stomach.

With 10 million won, I could buy a new ultrasound machine, or hydrotherapy equipment, or even renovate to increase the number of beds!

“You’ve heard of jeonse fraud, right? Even if it’s not fraud, when a villa goes to auction, the jeonse deposit becomes an issue for residential buildings. Even one-room or two-room jeonse deposits can be hundreds of millions of won.” 

TN: Jeonse fraud is a real estate scam in South Korea involving the jeonse system, where tenants pay a large deposit instead of monthly rent. Scammers exploit this system by either failing to return the deposit at the end of the lease, renting the same property to multiple tenants, or selling/mortgaging the property without the tenant’s knowledge. This leaves tenants with significant financial losses, as the deposits often represent a large portion of the property’s value.

“Ah, so my 10 million won is actually very little?”

“Yes. Commercial spaces are usually monthly rent. However, when the building is sold, the lease rights contracted with the previous building owner are extinguished, so you can be evicted regardless of the previous contract. Then there’s no way to recover the hundreds of millions of won already spent on key money or interior work.”

Oh, I finally understand.

I nodded, unable to contain my admiration.

“You explain things very well, like Yeowon.”

“Huh?”

“Well, it’s a field I know something about. But I’m not as good as you, Director.”

What are you talking about? Are you making fun of me? I was just nodding like an idiot.

“Still, it’s fortunate that the appraisal value is 1 billion won. In this situation, without key money, all floors should be able to receive their deposits back.”

The auction date had already been set, and the appraisal value was out.

Ten digits. How amazing. How does one go bankrupt with such assets?

With loans and taxes and whatnot, but if it sells for 1 billion won, there shouldn’t be a big problem, right?

I thought simply, but Seo In-ae shook her head.

“There’s no guarantee it will be sold for 1 billion won. I don’t think even I would buy it. I don’t have 1 billion won, but… our clinic uses the entire fourth floor, and the monthly rent is only 800,000 won? Then buying it at auction for 1 billion won doesn’t make any sense in terms of profitability.”

“Hmm.”

Seo In-ae compared the interest from putting 1 billion won in a bank deposit with the monthly rental income.

“Well, they could evict everyone and raise the rent… but that would have to be compared with market rates, and at first glance, it doesn’t seem like a particularly good deal.”

“What happens if no one wins the auction?”

“If no one wants to buy it, they keep lowering the price and re-announcing it. At 500 million, someone would buy it, right?”

True. Even I would buy it at 500 million.

No, even at 1 billion, it might be okay.

Of course, I didn’t say this out loud. It’s been two years since I opened my practice, and I’d obviously get scolded for still lacking financial sense.

“And here’s the dividend claim application form, which is probably for claiming your share from the auction proceeds.”

“Ah, we have to fill this out no matter what, right?”

This time, Hwang Sang-hoon spoke.

“Since we’re lower priority than the bonds, we’d have to fill it out to receive our deposit back. When I saw my aunt buy a building, if you have opposing power, you can stay and hold out. If you’re higher priority than the bonds, you can even continue the contract with the auction winner.”

“Ah, that’s right.”

Seo In-ae agreed.

Well, that’s that. So we should definitely apply, right?

“Then we fill this out, and if it’s sold for a decent amount, we receive our share and leave?”

“I guess so?”

“It might be difficult to renew the contract as is. We don’t know how much it will be sold for, but they’ll probably try to raise it a bit… Ah, I don’t know. I’m not an expert on this either!”

“Why don’t we talk to the people on the other floors first?”

That sounds good.

If I just do what the employees tell me to do, I’d be shifting the responsibility to them.

“Thank you both so much for your help.”

I can’t rely on the employees any more than this.

I’ll look into what I can, and ultimately, I have to make the decision.

I expressed my gratitude for their explanations and shared concerns.

◆◇◆◇◆

The next day.

For the first time since this incident occurred, all the tenants of the four-story building gathered in one place.

Wanting to discuss more with those in similar situations, I asked each floor, and everyone readily agreed to meet.

“You all received the court registration, right?”

“Yes… What are you all planning to do?”

The four of us gathered at the bakery on the first floor, with a restaurant on the second floor and an academy on the third.

Our clinic is on the top floor, the fourth.

The first and third floors signed contracts before me, and the second floor… was it last year? A dakgalbi restaurant moved in, and I occasionally went there for lunch.

“Tsk tsk, I knew that bastard would cause trouble with his big plans!”

The middle-aged man who owned the bakery on the first floor said.

Unlike me, who didn’t even know the building owner’s face, he seemed to know the situation quite well.

According to him, the original building owner was an elderly grandfather who had built this building with almost no loans and had been a good person who hadn’t raised the rent for decades.

But around the time the third-floor academy and I moved in, his grandson inherited it, and the current building owner took out a large loan using the building as collateral, apparently for some other business venture.

“So, the rest of you have deposits of 10 million won each…”

It’s frustrating, but 10 million won won’t cause a major problem.

I was relatively calm, and the first and third floors only cursed about the annoying situation but didn’t seem to consider 10 million won as extremely serious.

But the owner of the restaurant on the second floor was completely losing it.

The third floor is the same as us with 100 million deposit and 800,000 won monthly rent, the first floor is 100 million deposit and 1.5 million won rent, but the second floor agreed to lower the rent and increase the deposit to 500 million deposit and 100,000 won rent.

“Do they even do commercial rent like this? It’s almost like jeonse.”

“The, the landlord strongly suggested increasing the deposit, and I thought lowering the monthly rent would be good… I never imagined things would turn out like this…”

He sobbed even more upon seeing the lack of crisis awareness from the others.

“I won’t lose my deposit, right? It’s, it’s almost all of my assets!”

“If it’s sold for 1 billion won, there shouldn’t be a problem…”

The most composed was the director of the math academy.

“I was planning to move anyway. Of course, I’ll submit the dividend application. It would be nice if I could coordinate the timing of vacating with the auction winner, but if not, I’ll leave when they tell me to.”

He said the academy was doing well anyway, and he wanted to move closer to the station soon.

He planned to hold out without paying rent and leave when given an eviction notice.

“I’m a priority tenant anyway, and I still have some time left on my contract.”

The bakery owner shrugged while expressing annoyance.

Being a higher priority than the bank’s claim, he seemed able to maintain his lease contract.

His position was to definitely fulfill the contract period and continue afterward if possible. His point of annoyance was that renewing under the same conditions would likely be difficult.

“Ugh, uwaaa…!”

The restaurant owner on the second floor had already submitted his dividend application and was so scared that he wanted to close his business right away if only he could get his deposit back.

The meeting adjourned with his agonized groans in the background.

◆◇◆◇◆

The next day.

I shared the situation with the building and what I heard at the tenants’ meeting with my employees.

“So what happens to us? Are we going to move like the academy with this opportunity?”

Seol Yu-hee asked.

I had heard as many opinions as I could, but honestly, I hadn’t yet formed a clear stance.

Sigh…

Expansion, expansion, and now we might be forced to move to a bigger place like this?

That wasn’t necessarily bad.

A 0.7km slope from the station, I don’t think it’s too bad, but patients often grumble about why on earth I opened a clinic here.

Now that it’s come to this, it might be worth moving to a larger place like the academy, maximizing the deposit return and paying slightly higher rent.

“I don’t really want to do that.”

But it didn’t feel right.

Others think I chose this place for the clinic without any thought, but did you know this place is really good in terms of feng shui?

It’s a location where good energy gathers, so acupuncture here actually has better effects.

“Then for now, how about talking with the next auction winner?”

That’s an option too.

But it wasn’t the first priority.

Isn’t it a bit much to make no plans and rely on the intentions of someone we don’t even know?

They could unreasonably raise the deposit or rent, or they might tell us to leave unconditionally because they have other plans for the space.

Instead of answering the question definitively, I asked Seo In-ae something else.

“In-ae-ssaem.”

“Yes.”

“Is this building’s appraisal value of 1 billion won really that expensive?”

I kept leaning towards a third option.

“Pardon?”

Seo In-ae tilted her head.

Her expression showed she didn’t understand why I was asking her such a thing.

“You know the most about this among us, right? You said you studied auctions before.”

From what I’ve heard this time, she seems to be the most expert among everyone in this building.

Come to think of it, even when we were drinking together in the early days of opening the clinic, she said she was studying real estate auctions.

“I wouldn’t say I know that much.”

“But haven’t you won an auction before?”

Seo In-ae closed her mouth.

A moment of silence fell among the other employees.

“Director, surely…”

Seo In-ae hesitated.

“What?”

“Surely, really surely. I’m just asking just in case.”

“Go ahead.”

“You’re not… thinking of buying it, are you?”

“I could buy it if it’s cheap after looking into it, couldn’t I?”

I nodded.

Isn’t it something we could consider as a third possibility?

“Whaaaat?”

“You’re saying you’ll buy this building, Director?”

I just suggested a possibility.

For some reason, everyone’s jaws dropped in shock.