An Examination on House Lessee’s Right to Claim the Reimbursement of Beneficial Expenses from the Perspective of House Lessee Protection

Abstract

Nowadays, many house lessees pay diverse expenses to improve facilities for housing as a result of introduction of the right to request the renewal of contract into Housing Lease Protection Act in 2020. Before the introduction, the courts of Korea seem to have decided in the direction of expanding the independence of the result of paying the expenses to protect a house lessee. However, it can seriously undermine legal stability to interpret in the direction of expanding the independence of the result in this way in order to admit the right to claim the purchase of attachment. Also, I’d maintain that like a land lessee, a house lessee can exercise the right to claim the purchase of attachment only when he or she can demand the renewal of the house lease contract concerned. Accordingly, the right to claim the purchase of attachment is not given to the house lessee in the cases he or she has seriously violated his or her obligation as a house lessee, including the case for him or her to break all or part of the house concerned by intention or gross negligence, the case for him or her to sublease all or part of the house concerned without any consent of the house lessor, and the case his or her amount of the overdue rent is over the amount of the rent for two periods. Thus, the right to claim the purchase of attachment is not given to the house lessee who did not meet his or her obligation of the lease contract concerned in this way. On the other hand, the right to claim the reimbursement of beneficial expenses is given even to such a house lessee because in terms of legal characteristics, it is a kind of the right to claim the restitution of unjust enrichment. For these reasons, from the perspective of protecting a house lessee, this Article focuses on examining the legal principles of the right to claim the reimbursement of beneficial expenses themselves, away from the attempt to view the result of paying the expenses as the object of the right to claim the purchase of attachment rather than as the object of the right to claim the reimbursement of beneficial expenses in order to protect a house lessee. This Article examines the case a house lessee himself or herself exercises the right to claim the reimbursement of beneficial expenses and the case a house lessee transfers the right to claim the reimbursement of beneficial expenses to a third party.