Background
Our clients, a husband and young child, are the heirs of a woman who died in August 2022. In December 2021, her father bought an apartment for KRW 320 million. Between June and August 2022, the wife paid a total of KRW 40,480,000 to the apartment's tenant to return lease deposits on her father's behalf.
The heirs sued the father to recover the money as a loan. The father argued that it was a gift, saying his daughter had received much family support and wanted to return assets to her parents. The first-instance court did not grant the claim.
What Was at Stake
With no written loan agreement, the issue was whether the money was lent or given.
How Changchun Helped
Law Firm Changchun represented the heirs from the appeal onward. The appellate court accepted their position that the payment was a loan, based on the following:
Contemporaneous messages. Before paying, the wife asked her husband whether she could lend her mother money; on the payment date she said she had lent it.
Her finances made a gift unlikely. Her account held only about KRW 80 million, and she was repaying a loan of roughly KRW 1 million a month.
The other side appeared to acknowledge a debt. After the wife's death, her mother told the husband she owed him something but could not pay right away.
Outcome
In October 2025, the appellate court reversed the first-instance judgment and ordered the father to pay KRW 24,288,000 to the husband and KRW 16,192,000 to the child, with delay damages, according to their inheritance shares. The father bore 90% of total costs. In February 2026, the Supreme Court of Korea dismissed his final appeal without a hearing on the merits, and the judgment became final.
Even in family transactions, messages, account records and later statements can show that money was lent rather than given. (Outcomes depend on the facts of each case.)