In Korea, recently, efforts have been made to introduce BIM(Building Information Modeling) to housing complex projects. However, there have been several problems including excessive competition for building design and outcome-oriented evaluation due to a lack of clear evaluation criteria and poorly organized management process. Under this circumstance, the study surveyed opinions of project managers and conducted a pilot test to improve evaluation criteria of BIM-based design for housing complexes. The objective is to assess the level of BIM technology and its applicability, and to propose a list of reasonable evaluation criteria for better project management. First, the study examined the current condition of evaluation on the BIM-based housing complexes, and identified 15 preliminary items that might be suitable for application of BIM. Second, the study conducted a pilot test for the 15 items to determine their suitability for the level of BIM technology, clarity of the calculation process, and the extent of fulfilling information quality, and short-listed eight items for application of BIM. In particular, in the design concept stage, mostly 3D visual images and area-related items are suitable for BIM-based evaluation. Accordingly, formerly used items such as project cost, energy and environmental analysis, building structure, and facilities were deemed more relevant to the subsequent stages of basic design and its implementation.