[Edaily Reporter Kim Hyun-ah ] Despite rising housing prices and the growing burden of housing costs, people in their 20s and 30s are not giving up on homeownership and building wealth. As it becomes increasingly difficult to grow their assets on a salary alone, they are boosting their income through side jobs, managing their assets through investments and tax planning, and even turning to artificial intelligence (AI) to find new sources of income.

With the popularization of generative AI making content creation and task automation easier, the nature of side jobs is also changing. Rather than simply increasing working hours, people are using AI to boost productivity and find new sources of income online.

Kim Ji-yeon, Class Team Lead at the financial education company “Salaryman Millionaires,” introduced this trend during a presentation titled “Young People’s Concerns About Homeownership and Changing Wealth-Building Trends.”

”

Seoul Home Prices Equivalent to 13.9 Years’ Income… Yet “I

Still

Need My Own Home”

Housing conditions for young people remain extremely difficult. According to the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport’s Housing Conditions Survey

,

Seoul’s PIR (Price-to-Income Ratio) stands at 13.9

years

. The PIR is an indicator that shows how many years’ worth of income a home price represents, assuming all annual income is saved.

82.6% of young households live in rental housing, while the homeownership rate stands at just 12.2%. Among all age groups, average assets decreased by 0.3% only for households aged 39 and under.

However, this does not mean that the desire to own a home has diminished. In a survey cited by Kim Reed, 89.6% of young people responded that “homeownership is necessary” for housing stability and asset accumulation.

This means that although the burden of housing costs has increased, the need to own a home remains high.

Salary Alone Isn’t Enough… Over Half of People in Their 20s and 30s Hold Two Jobs

Attention is focusing on ways to grow assets. As it becomes increasingly difficult to bridge the gap in housing prices and wealth with a salary alone, there is a growing trend toward securing income outside of one’s primary job.

A survey found that 55.2% of office workers in their 20s and 57.0% of those in their 30s are holding down two jobs. As interest in tax savings and asset management has also grown, the proportion of people in their 20s and 30s among ISA (Individual Comprehensive Asset Management Account) subscribers reached 41.1%.

The wealth-building education market is also changing. Financial education, which used to focus primarily on real estate, has recently expanded to include basic financial management, side hustles, and monetizing content without capital.

AI Lowers Barriers to Entry for Side Hustles… Content Creation Made Easy

AI is being utilized as a means to lower the barriers to entry in this

side-hustle market

.

Generative AI can reduce the time and cost required for content creation, such as writing, image production, and video editing. By automating repetitive tasks, it also reduces the time burden of balancing a primary job with a side hustle.

According to data from the National Tax Service, the number of solo content creators has increased 3.7-fold over the past four years, with approximately 80% of them being young people in their 30s or younger.

It is explained that even without being a famous creator with a massive following, the practice of consistently producing content using AI and generating revenue from small-scale channels is gaining attention as a form of side hustle.

Wealth Management Education Shifts from “Real Estate” to “Side Hustles”

The use of AI in wealth-building education is

also

on the rise.

“Salaryman Millionaires” have expanded the share of their revenue from non-real estate sectors to over 30% and are offering courses on monetizing content without capital. ClassTeam also independently developed and implemented an “AI Workbook” in just three weeks, which provides features such as tracking students’ learning progress, review quizzes, and Q&A chatbots.

Since the introduction of the AI Workbook, new customers have increased 1.98 times compared to the previous month, and reviews confirming earnings have risen 1.69 times. The repurchase rate for the flagship side hustle course also rose from 9% to 35%.

Real-life side hustle success stories were also shared. One office worker, who started by running both a Naver Blog and a Google AdSense blog, is now earning over 1 million won per month just 10 to 11 months after starting.

This individual, who previously worked in video editing, discovered after first encountering blogging that it was possible to generate income through Google AdSense. Although not initially familiar with computers, they set up a blog by taking the course and, through consistent management, reached the point of earning over 1 million won per month.

Kim Ji-yeon, a Lead, stated, “Young people haven’t given up on buying their own homes; rather, they are building assets more smartly and maturely than ever before,” adding, “We will continue to refine our support solutions—which combine technology and education—so that the concerns of the 20s and 30s generation can translate into actual income and results.”

Rather than dampening the 20s and 30s generation’s determination to buy a home, high housing prices are effectively changing the way they build wealth. Moving beyond simply saving their salaries to build a nest egg, they are expanding their income streams through side hustles, managing their assets with financial products, and even using AI to boost the productivity of their side hustles.