Real estate businesses propose banks extend loan terms for construction contractors. Photo: VNA

Positive signal

According to statistics from the Vietnam Real Estate Association (VNREA), a series of large real estate projects from North to South, with diverse segments, are launching sales campaigns, home loan interest rates are decreasing, people are shifting their investment to real estate, accepting "cutting losses"... are positive signals that are promoting the recovery of the real estate market.

In the North, the apartment segment in the fourth quarter of 2023 has been supplemented with supply from the new project The Canopy Residences in Vinhomes Smart City urban area in Hanoi , with a scale of about 1,800 apartments or from The Moonlight 1 An Lac project, Rose Town Ngoc Hoi... The low-rise, adjacent segment received information on the opening of sales of projects such as Aquarius Hung Yen, Sapa City Clouds Lao Cai, Danko Center urban area in Tuyen Quang...

In the Southern region, new supply is being added from the next sales phase of projects: Akari City, Glory Heights, Mastery Centre Point, The Global City... or Eco Village Saigon River, Fiato City Dong Nai, Astral City Binh Duong ; Waterpoint Long An... Meanwhile, in the Central region, information about new projects opening for sale "warms up" the market after a long period of silence such as Eco Central Park Vinh, The Panorama 2 Da Nang, The Sailing Quy Nhon...

In particular, after a long absence from the market, the resort real estate segment has been added to the market. Real estate businesses propose that banks extend the loan period for contractors. The market supply from large projects such as: The 5Way Phu Quoc, Regal Legend Quang Binh, The Ocean Resort Quy Nhon... Notably, newly opened projects have attracted the attention of investors, recording orders many times higher than the number of sales thanks to attractive policies.

In addition to the primary real estate market, the secondary market also recorded positive signs of recovery, with more segments showing signs of "overcoming the bottom". If, in the past, secondary transactions only appeared mainly in the land and residential housing segment with prices under 3 billion VND/product, now, with positive information from improved demand and from diverse supply sources "cutting losses" of investors, from collateral assets being real estate foreclosed by banks, plus interest rates adjusted down to the level of early 2022, the "idle" cash flow among people began to circulate for investment, real estate products priced from 3 - 5 billion VND... began to be invested by investors to anticipate the new growth cycle from early 2024.

According to Dr. Nguyen Van Dinh, Vice President of VNREA, real estate supply is gradually improving from the fourth quarter of 2023, but most of it comes from the next sales phases of old projects and is still far short of the real demand of the market, especially the affordable segment. For the market to develop truly safely, healthily and sustainably, it is necessary to gradually reduce the gap between supply and demand. Therefore, supply needs to be stimulated and appropriately regulated by the State through land allocation and land lease in the direction of having preferential policies and mechanisms for the development of low-cost commercial housing.

In addition, the number of transactions also showed signs of increasing, with 2,700 products in the first quarter; 3,700 products in the second quarter; nearly 6,000 products in the third quarter and continued to increase in the fourth quarter. However, these figures are only about 10% compared to the total transactions before the COVID-19 pandemic. Notably, there are currently about 1,200 real estate projects stuck, mainly in Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City, which need to be resolved soon to create supply.

Legal policy determines the market

At the 6th session of the 15th National Assembly, the Land Law (amended), Housing Law (amended) and Real Estate Business Law are being awaited by public opinion and real estate businesses like "waiting for rain in a drought", because they are closely related to the recovery and stable development of the real estate market in the coming time. In addition to the National Assembly's plan to pass the Housing Law (amended) and the Real Estate Business Law at the 6th session, the Land Law (amended) has not been passed by the National Assembly at this session and will be postponed to the nearest session in 2024. In fact, the draft Land Law (amended) still has many contents that need to be consulted, such as: Land recovery issues, agreements on receiving land use rights to implement socio-economic development projects without using State budget capital; land recovery to implement commercial housing projects; regulations on transparent land valuation methods, etc.

According to Prof. Dr. Dang Hung Vo, former Deputy Minister of Natural Resources and Environment, the failure to pass the Land Law (amended) will certainly affect the real estate market, because this is an important law that plays a role in guiding the development of the market. However, the law should only be passed when it has been revised, supplemented, and completed, correctly and accurately addressing the issues that society and the market need.

Mr. Nguyen Quoc Hiep, Chairman of the Vietnam Association of Construction Contractors, also said that the Land Law (amended) is an important law. If it is passed and the specific conditions in the law not only fail to resolve the problems raised, but also create many new problems, then it is better to "go slow and steady", because the quality of the law needs to be put first. If it is done hastily and the content is not suitable, it will take 10 years to be amended, and the consequences will be extremely serious...

From a market perspective, forecasting the end of 2023 and the first half of 2024, according to Dr. Nguyen Van Dinh, supply will continue to improve, but not enough to relieve the "thirst". Therefore, to focus on restoring confidence and promoting the recovery of the real estate market, in addition to promoting the activities of the Prime Minister's working group, each locality needs to establish a separate group to speed up the removal of difficulties for projects that are "shelved" and still have problems. At the same time, the Government needs to continue to issue detailed documents to serve as a basis for handling real estate-related issues and can be applied immediately in practice.

Particularly for social housing, ministries, branches and localities need to have special mechanisms that are attractive enough and create favorable conditions for both businesses and people to access. In fact, this is a special real estate segment, and it is not possible to apply related regulations and policies like other real estate segments. In addition, the State Bank needs to have policies suitable for each project, contributing to supporting timely resolution of capital and credit issues for real estate businesses and real estate buyers, in order to minimize arising consequences and prolonged difficulties.

In addition, State management agencies need to quickly have a mechanism for real estate business groups, real estate projects that issue corporate bonds, borrow credit... that are facing difficulties that have not been resolved and must fulfill their obligations in 2024, avoiding the situation of "waiting until the last minute", causing pressure on the market.

According to News