Speed up progress of social housing projects

Investing in social housing for low-income people not only ensures a place to live, but also contributes to creating a foundation for ensuring social security and sustainable development. Ho Chi Minh City is making efforts to realize that determination with many solutions, implementing a series of projects in the next phase.

**The Thu Thiem Green House social housing project is about to be completed and put into use on Vo Chi Cong Street, Cat Lai Ward, Ho Chi Minh City. (Photo: THE ANH)**

This is also one of the important solutions for the city to aim for long-term, sustainable goals, building the city into a urban civilized, modern, and affectionate.

After a period of slow implementation, even "freezing", recently, many projects social housing in the city have completed legal procedures to restart construction, bringing much hope to beneficiaries. Recently, the Thu Duc social housing project with a scale of three seven-storey buildings with many serving utilities has been started. The project has a total floor area of nearly ^30,000m2to provide more than 200 apartments to the market. This is a project in the residential complex of Hiep Binh Phuoc amusement park located on the Saigon River, with a convenient location in direct connection to major traffic routes.

Previously, the social housing project at No. 4, Phan Chu Trinh (Binh Thanh Ward) was also started to provide nearly 900 apartments. When completed and put into use in 2027, it will be a resettlement project for people affected by the dredging project, environmental improvement, infrastructure construction of Xuyen Tam canal as well as other cases. City leaders affirmed that this is one of the projects to ensure housing development targets for the city.

The Thu Thiem Green House project is entering the final stages of construction to hand over more than 1,000 apartments in the fourth quarter of this year. This social housing project is located on the frontage of Vo Chi Cong Street, near the city center with about 15 minutes of travel. That location can conveniently access surrounding arterial roads such as Mai Chi Tho, Huynh Tan Phat, metro system, ... as well as move to the central area, District 4, District 7 (old) in about 10-15 minutes. The implementation process and construction progress of the project are guaranteed because before starting construction, the investor has completed all legal procedures along with actively arranged capital.

These consecutive launches are a positive sign. However, in reality, overall, the specific results are still modest, when the demand for social housing is very large, while there is a lack of projects being brought to the market regularly. Mr. and Mrs. Nguyen Thai Linh, residing in Hiep Binh ward, are workers in Linh Trung Export Processing Zone. They have both worked in Ho Chi Minh City for more than 15 years, but are still renting a place to live. Through many introductions, they have learned about social housing projects but the opportunity has not come yet, when the couple's income is only about 20 million VND/month. Every month, after deducting expenses, the remaining amount is not enough for the couple to own a social house.

In fact, the demand is so great but the supply is very small. According to a report by the Ho Chi Minh City Real Estate Association, in the first 6 months of this year, besides some high-priced commercial projects, the number of social housing apartments on the market is very limited. As of 2025, the city has only six completed projects with 2,745 apartments, four other projects with a scale of more than 2,800 apartments are under implementation.

According to the target, in the 2021-2025 period, the city must complete the target of 18,000 units. However, with the current implementation, completing the set target is almost impossible. Joining hands to implement the Government 's project to build at least one million social housing units in the 2021-2030 period, Ho Chi Minh City will contribute 199,400 units. Thus, from now until 2030, this task will become even more difficult when many shortcomings and limitations are still major bottlenecks that have not been resolved.

Untangle the knots to speed things up

Citing the shortcomings in construction investment procedures, the Ho Chi Minh City Real Estate Association pointed out the reality: Some projects were launched with great fanfare, but then stopped due to planning and legal procedures, leading to not being granted a construction permit. Even to be granted a permit for a housing construction project, businesses have to spend many years completing procedures and waiting. This causes a huge waste of resources for businesses and society.

Chairman of the Ho Chi Minh City Real Estate Association Le Hoang Chau said: In terms of boundaries, the new Ho Chi Minh City will open up new opportunities in infrastructure planning, traffic, and facilitate land allocation. Combined with the positive new points after Resolution No. 201/2025/QH15 dated May 29, 2025 of the National Assembly on piloting a number of specific mechanisms and policies for social housing development, the city will have many favorable conditions to achieve its goals in the next phase. However, to turn these opportunities into favorable conditions, the city must be more determined in removing bottlenecks in administrative procedures, legal procedures, planning as well as many other resources.

Ho Chi Minh City currently has nearly 14 million people, of which the proportion of people in need of housing is very large, especially immigrants, workers, civil servants, etc. Over the years, these are also people who have contributed greatly to the development of the city. Therefore, the responsibility of creating a place to live for the city's residents is extremely urgent and important.

The task of developing social housing in the coming period is very heavy. Therefore, to complete the target, the city has included the system of socio-economic development indicators to monitor, supervise and direct in a timely manner. The city also comprehensively reviewed the planning of functional areas, forecasted the population size and actual demand to serve as a basis for appropriate land allocation. In particular, the city has promoted the implementation of administrative procedure reform with the goal of reducing 30% of the time to process records and procedures related to social housing projects.
Vice Chairman of Ho Chi Minh City People's Committee
Nguyen Loc Ha

Vice Chairman of the Ho Chi Minh City People's Committee Nguyen Loc Ha said: The task of developing social housing in the coming period is very heavy. Therefore, to complete the target, the city has included the socio-economic development indicators in the system to monitor, supervise and direct in a timely manner. The city also comprehensively reviewed the planning of functional areas, forecasted the population size and actual demand to serve as a basis for appropriate land allocation. In particular, the city has promoted the implementation of administrative procedure reform with the goal of reducing 30% of the time to process records and procedures related to social housing projects.

Recently, the city has directed the Department of Construction to urgently work with investors, requiring project investors to complete procedures and start construction within 12 months from the date of site allocation. The Department of Construction has coordinated with relevant units to develop and complete the process and procedures for social housing development to facilitate investors in the process of processing documents. Currently, the city has also planned to set aside about 1,400 hectares of land for social housing development; of which, half is being deployed for 116 projects, the rest will be allocated synchronously according to the city's general planning scheme.

Experts say: With the favorable mechanisms just issued, especially Resolution No. 201, the city needs to urgently complete preferential policies for investors as well as preferential policies on loans for beneficiaries, effectively applying the mechanisms and policies from this resolution. After the merger, with a large geographical space, reviewing surplus land funds and headquarters to create a land fund list is also a solution that needs to be considered to diversify and enrich the land fund for this work. In addition, implementing preferential and open policies to attract businesses to participate in projects is extremely necessary. This is a real need, but many businesses have withdrawn from the game when encountering too many problems with administrative procedures, legal issues, etc.

It can be seen that many bottlenecks are gradually being resolved, specifically the facilitating mechanisms from Resolution No. 201 of the National Assembly will help the city speed up the progress of social housing projects.

Source: https://baolangson.vn/day-nhanh-tien-do-cac-du-an-nha-o-xa-hoi-5059645.html