When to check a Korean worker living-stability loan
A parent’s medical bill, a family funeral or a child’s wedding can create an immediate cash need.
South Korea’s worker living-stability direct-loan program lets qualifying workers apply for specific expenses under employment, income and family-evidence requirements.
Compare the possible principal with cash available after the upfront guarantee fee, so the amount you expect to borrow does not hide a remaining household shortfall.
Three decisions supported by this calculator
- Identify the relevant medical, wedding, funeral, elderly-parent, child-raising or small-living expense purpose.
- Check application conditions and the separate purpose, individual and all-program guarantee limits.
- Save the net proceeds, remaining shortfall, repayment estimates and document checklist for a KCOMWEL discussion.
This is a South Korea-specific 2026 planning tool.
The checklist compares your entered facts with current rules; KCOMWEL decides eligible costs and evidence, guarantee issuance and available funding, while the bank confirms the loan terms.
Six direct-loan purposes, limits and reference deadlines
The table uses Articles 10–14 of the Labor Welfare Operating Regulation effective July 28, 2026.
Choose the purpose before estimating the principal: each category has its own eligible event, recipient, evidence and ceiling.
2026 South Korean worker living-stability direct-loan purpose limits and application reference periods| Purpose | Purpose ceiling (KRW) | Reference application period |
|---|
| Medical expenses | Actual eligible cost, up to 10,000,000 | Within 3 years of payment or commencement of care |
| Wedding expenses | 12,500,000 | Within 3 years of marriage registration, applicant or child |
| Funeral expenses | 10,000,000 | Within 1 year of death |
| Elderly-parent support | 5,000,000/person; maximum 20,000,000 | Applicant’s or spouse’s parents/grandparents aged 65+, before death |
| Child raising | 5,000,000/child; maximum 20,000,000 | Children under age 18 |
| Small living expenses | 2,000,000 | Within 6 months of the qualifying event; income/sales decrease of at least 30% |
Each application must be at least KRW 500,000 and use KRW 100,000 increments.
The ordinary individual total loan ceiling is KRW 20,000,000; using more than one purpose does not create separate unrestricted individual totals.
Existing limit usage and remaining guarantee capacity can reduce a purpose’s otherwise available ceiling.
Employment category and individual income
Service period and reported days
Ordinary employees and special-type service providers need at least three months of current service at the relevant business.
Solo proprietors need at least three months of the applicable small-business-owner industrial accident insurance and no employed workers at the previous month end.
Daily employees and daily special-type service providers need at least 45 reported work days in the preceding 90 days; small living loans use a 180-day window.
The KRW 2.68 million threshold
Ordinary eligibility uses 50% of the fixed three-person 2026 median income, KRW 5,359,036, rounded upward to the next KRW 10,000: KRW 2,680,000 or less.
Compare the individual’s assessed average monthly income, not combined household take-home pay.
Daily employees are exempt from this income test; fixed-term, part-time, dispatched and daily special-type service providers do not automatically receive that exemption.
Article 2 defines average monthly income from business, employment and other income with the relevant tax exemptions, expenses and assessment period adjustments.
Income from multiple jobs is combined; leave periods, short prior-year service and the average daily-remuneration alternative need documented treatment.
A bank-account deposit total can differ from the official assessment.
If the agency substitutes household health-insurance premiums for unavailable income documents, this direct numeric comparison cannot decide that alternative assessment.
Family relationships, eligible expenses and ages
Medical expenses and dependency
Medical eligibility covers the worker and qualifying dependent spouse, children, and the worker’s or spouse’s parents or grandparents for the regulated treatment, postpartum-care and elderly nursing-facility costs.
Use evidence from the relevant health-care or medical-aid institution; medicines purchased without a prescription are excluded.
Dependency requires actual support and the regulation’s evidence, including the ordinary six-month same-household condition or qualifying six-month health-insurance dependency evidence where the household condition is not met.
Do not mix unrecognized transport or discretionary spending into the eligible-cost input.
Several parents or children
Elderly-parent support concerns living parents or grandparents of the applicant or spouse aged at least 65.
Enter the youngest counted adult’s birth date, and separately verify every counted person’s relationship, living status and support conditions.
For child raising, count eligible children under 18 and enter the oldest counted child’s birth date to obtain a common reference deadline.
Once one child turns 18, remove that child and recalculate for the remaining eligible children.
Family succession after an applicant’s death, the reinstatement-refusal exception following an unfair-dismissal decision, and legal-representative consent for a minor require agency assessment.
Certified artists are excluded from direct loans; foreign or overseas-Korean status, registered credit/public information and fraudulent-loan cancellation history require guarantee-restriction checks.
Selecting no restrictions without checking the evidence can produce an overly favorable provisional result.
Reference deadlines and the 30% income-loss test
Medical inputs use the documented payment date or care commencement date; wedding inputs use marriage registration, and funeral inputs use the death date.
Calendar years or months are added, with the last day of the destination month used when an equivalent day does not exist.
The under-18 child condition makes the day before the eighteenth birthday the last reference date.
For a February 29 birth, Civil Act Articles 158–160 count the birth date and end the period at the final day’s close, so the new full age begins March 1 in a non-leap year.
Holidays and online or in-person submission times are not automatically adjusted; confirm the notice, transitional treatment of older events and filing procedure with KCOMWEL.
Small living-loan example
Qualifying small living expenses require the regulated personal or business suspension/leave or seasonal/public-work income-loss circumstances.
A decrease from KRW 2,000,000 to KRW 1,400,000 is exactly 30% and meets the numeric test.
KRW 1,400,001 in the affected month is less than a 30% decrease and fails it.
A zero previous-month amount cannot produce a usable percentage decrease.
Prepare the prior and affected months’ pay, commissions or sales evidence and the qualifying cause together.
A medical reference deadline displayed in 2029 is calculated from the 2026 rule; it does not guarantee that the program or rules will remain the same in 2029.
The supported review-date window is July 28–December 31, 2026; dates outside it withhold the verified disbursement budget.
Separate purpose, individual and guarantee limits
Calculation sequence
- Subtract agency-confirmed purpose usage from the purpose ceiling.
- Subtract total living-loan usage from the individual total ceiling.
- Subtract guarantee balances across all programs from the guarantee ceiling, then convert capacity to principal using the guarantee share.
- Deduct confirmed same-cost support from eligible expense and compare the resulting ceiling with requested principal.
- Round downward to KRW 100,000 units; amounts below KRW 500,000 become zero.
With medical-purpose usage of KRW 3 million, total loan usage of KRW 15 million and guarantees of KRW 18 million, ordinary remaining capacities are KRW 7 million, 5 million and 2 million.
At a 100% guarantee share and sufficient eligible cost, the smallest capacity limits the plan to KRW 2 million.
Purpose usage is already part of total usage: do not add them before deducting from the total ceiling.
Ask the agency which original amounts or remaining balances apply and whether repayment permits another application.
Own cash reduces the funding shortfall; this model does not treat it as an automatic reduction in the statutory principal ceiling.
0.9% guarantee fees and 1.5% reference interest
The official 2026 direct-loan guide gives a 1.5% annual interest reference, while the credit-guarantee annex sets a 0.9% annual base fee for worker living-stability loans.
Enter the actual contractual interest and guarantee share; 100% guarantee coverage is a planning assumption.
The base guarantee fee is collected at execution separately from loan interest; early repayment requires a fee adjustment under the regulation.
Guarantee-fee budget formula
Principal × guarantee share × 0.009 × [grace years + (repayment years + 1) / 2].
Article 15 uses expected opening guarantee balances for each repayment year.
Fully guaranteed KRW 10 million produces an estimated KRW 270,000 fee for 1+3 years or KRW 315,000 for 1+4 years.
Actual execution and first-payment dates, day counts, rounding and exemptions can change the confirmed upfront amount.
Equal-principal repayment
Monthly principal = principal / repayment months.
Monthly interest = opening principal balance × annual percentage / 1,200.
During grace, principal remains unchanged and interest is paid; during repayment, a fixed principal amount reduces the balance and subsequent interest.
Totals are calculated at full precision before rounding to KRW, so displayed monthly rounded amounts may sum slightly differently.
Current Article 13 provides a one-year grace period followed by three or four years of equal-principal repayment, including small living loans.
Compare the first principal-repayment month with your household budget, as grace-period interest alone understates that later payment.
Special employment-crisis rules and interest subsidies
Verify special applicability
Agency-confirmed crisis, preemptive-response and specially supported industry applicants use the four-person median KRW 6,494,738 for the 50% test, rounded up to KRW 3,250,000, and a KRW 30 million individual/guarantee reference ceiling.
Additional plans are two years grace plus four years repayment, or three years grace plus five years repayment.
Residence alone does not establish eligibility: verify the business, designation period and any different temporary notice with the agency.
A separate interest-subsidy program
Interest-subsidy loans cover elderly-parent support, funerals, weddings and child raising under different income and purpose limits.
They use a 100% median-income criterion, wedding principal up to KRW 20 million and child raising up to KRW 10 million per child.
Borrower interest is bank interest less the approved subsidy; this direct-loan calculator does not apply its 1.5%/0.9% assumptions to that program.
Use the calculator in five steps
- Select purpose and work category. Enter service or insurance commencement, reported days and assessed individual monthly income from the relevant documents.
- Verify the event and family. Use medical, marriage or death evidence, or the income-loss records, and check every counted recipient.
- Reconcile capacities and funds. Enter agency-confirmed limit usage, all-program guarantee balances, cash and confirmed support for this expense.
- Choose a plan or verified approval budget. Actual approved principal, contractual rate, guarantee share, selected repayment terms and confirmed upfront fee are needed for a verified disbursement budget.
- Save the result and document list. Resolve unknown items with KCOMWEL and confirm the subsequent bank agreement and execution process.
Article 18 generally requires the agreement within 15 days of the eligibility/recommendation decision notice, with a possible extension for recognized special circumstances.
This tool does not request that notice date or automatically generate that deadline; follow the actual notice and guarantee validity period.
Fictional example: a KRW 10 million medical loan
Assume eligible medical expense KRW 13 million, confirmed same-cost support KRW 1 million, own cash KRW 1 million, requested principal KRW 10 million and zero existing usage.
Review date is 2026-10-14, service commenced 2026-01-01, individual income is KRW 2.5 million and the medical event date is 2026-09-01, with all evidence assumed verified.
The medical reference deadline is 2029-09-01, with a KRW 10 million ordinary medical-purpose ceiling.
Pre-application 1+3-year plan
- Estimated fee KRW 270,000; net proceeds KRW 9,730,000.
- Remaining shortfall KRW 1,270,000.
- Grace monthly interest KRW 12,500; first repayment KRW 290,278.
- Last repayment KRW 278,125; total interest KRW 381,250.
Approved plan with a confirmed fee
If the actual upfront fee is confirmed as KRW 280,000 and principal and terms are also verified, net proceeds are KRW 9,720,000.
The shortfall after other support and own cash is KRW 1,280,000.
That fee applies to the approved selected plan only and does not confirm the other plans’ fees.
The same principal under 1+4 years produces estimated fee KRW 315,000, net proceeds KRW 9,685,000 and shortfall KRW 1,315,000.
First repayment decreases to KRW 220,833, while total interest increases to KRW 456,250.
The example button’s verified states, approval and amounts are fictional teaching assumptions; it does not fetch your actual approval records.
Interpret unknown, failed and provisionally met conditions
Further verification needed
The checklist identifies missing employment, purpose, limit, restriction or special-rule evidence.
Unconfirmed support is excluded from available funds; any pre-application plan remains a separate hypothetical disbursement scenario.
Entered conditions not met
Failed employment, income, date, age or restriction conditions withhold planning and verified disbursement budgets.
Recheck the contract, assessed income, selected program, purpose and counted family members.
Conditions provisionally met
All passed input checks still do not guarantee approval or payment.
Article 16 selection priorities, remaining program funds and guarantee review can affect the application.
If approved principal exceeds the verified ceiling or conflicts with the minimum/increment rules, the tool withholds the disbursement budget until the documents are reconciled.
Frequently asked questions
Does exactly KRW 2,680,000 meet the income test?
The ordinary numeric threshold is inclusive, but the actual average-income calculation and evidence still require verification.
Are all non-regular employees exempt from income testing?
The current exemption applies to daily employees; fixed-term, part-time and dispatched workers must check their own income conditions.
What happens if I count two elderly parents?
Two qualifying living relatives aged at least 65 give a KRW 10 million purpose ceiling, before individual-loan and guarantee capacities are applied.
Can a child be counted on their eighteenth birthday?
The child must be under 18, so remove that child on the eighteenth birthday and recalculate using other qualifying children.
Why is planned principal zero?
Remaining capacities or eligible costs may be insufficient, or rounding down to KRW 100,000 units may leave less than the KRW 500,000 minimum.
Is the guarantee fee paid with monthly interest?
The base fee is collected when the debt is executed; monthly interest depends on outstanding principal, so check the separate upfront deduction notice.
Does this also calculate interest-subsidy loans?
Those loans have different purposes, income limits, principal ceilings and bank-rate mechanics, so this tool calculates direct loans only.
Can I apply using the saved result alone?
Prepare the underlying employment, income, family, purpose, capacity and guarantee documents and confirm the actual loan agreement with KCOMWEL or the local branch.
Official evidence and maintenance checks
The National Law Information OPEN API was queried directly on 2026-10-14.
Verified texts include Framework Act Article 19 MST243061, Enforcement Rule Article 2 MST291197 effective that day, Operating Notice 2026-58 serial 2100000283222, and Guarantee Notice 2026-59 serial 2100000283182.
Both operating and guarantee notices took effect on 2026-07-28; Median Income Notice 2025-135 serial 2100000262584 applies from 2026-01-01.
Operating Articles 2 and 10–14 and Guarantee Articles 9, 10 and 15–17 plus the annex support the eligibility and fee model.
Recheck next-year median income and program notices, temporary regional provisions, interest, guarantee fees, budget availability, repeat applications, capacity accounting, eligible costs and family evidence.
Actual disbursement dates, first installments, holidays, rounding and early-repayment adjustments follow the contract and agency instructions.
Take the checklist and cash shortfall to KCOMWEL
Enter verified purpose, work, income and capacity records above, then save the TXT report or print the result.
Record the expense due date and shortfall after the upfront fee to prepare specific questions for the agency.
If you need living support during vocational training, use the separate calculator for recognized training and eligible training months.