Domestic property market sees recovery: ministry

HÀ NỌI — The Ministry of Construction (MoC) believes the domestic real

estate market has overcome the most difficult period due to positive
developments in the market as well as the whole economy in the fourth quarter
of 2020.
The industrial property segment can be considered a bright spot of the domestic
market for many reasons such as the European Linion - Vietnam Free Trade
Agreement (EVFTA) coming into efect and plans for the relocation of many
multinational corborations to Việt Nam, according to the ministry.
Meanwhile, Việt Nam's successful disease control is also an important factor to
attract more foreign investment.
'Those factors would set a good foundation for the real estate market to develop
stably in 2021, a representative ofthe ministry said
In the fourth quarter of 2020, most businesses in the real estate sector started
Operating again.
Although the market sill faces many difficulties, real estate develobers have
offered solutions to attract customers like changing areas for developing
property projects to catch up with trends of shifting FDI inflows and
urbanisation in localities outside big cities, according to the ministry.
Thanks to produect handover activities, project share transfers, asset liquidation
and the đevelopment of industrial realestate, some real estate businesses gained
record profits.

- Nearly 8O large listed real estate companies achieved or exceeded their after-
tax profit goals.
The domestic real estate marketin the fourth quarter of 2020 strongly increased
compared to the deep reduction in previous quarters of last year due to the rapid
recovery of the housing and industrial zone segments, helping the property
sector maintain positive growth for 2020.In 2020, the real estate sector
contributed about 4.42 per cent of national GDP. In 2020, the real estate
industry also had changes in businesses Accordingly, the number of newly-
established enterprises was 6,694, down 15.5 per cent compared to 2019, while
978 enterprises completed dissolution procedures. According to the Ministry of
Construction, the total outstanding debt of the real estate sector in 2020
increased quarter by quarter. Specifically, the debt reachedVNĐ8.3 trillion
(SS361 million) in the first quarter and hit VNĐ8.5 trillion in the second quarter
and VNĐ 8.6 trillion in the third quarter. As of December 31, 2020, the debt
reached more thanVNĐS§.8 trillion
Besides banking loans, proberty companies in 2020 attracted capital from other
sources such as individual investment capital, remittances and capital from
issuing stocks and bonds. Regarding supply and transaction of real estate
products, the ministry's representative said by the end of the first quarter of
2020, apartment inventories on the market were estimated at nearly 13,000
units.

- In the second and third quarters, the negative impact of the COVID-19
pandemie, as well as problems im terms of mechanisms and policies, afected the
progress of implementing investment procedures of property projects and also
the progress of implementing those projects. So, the market did not have
significant growth of new supply im those quarters. However, the real estate
market was still a safe imvestment channel so apartment inventories reduced to
6,000 units at the end of the third quarter of 2020.
Entering the fourth quarter, the market had a new supply of nearly 30.000
apartments and transactions were sill quite stable. The mimistry reported that
Last year, the domestie market had a total imventory of apartments of about
9,000 tmifs nationwide. Of which, the localities with large inventory included
Đà Nẵng, Khánh Hòa, Kiên Giang and Bình Dương.
Meanwhile, the property market in Hà Nội, HCM City, Quảng Ninh and
localities with strong urbanisation such as Cân Thơ, Long An and Đồng Nai
maintained stable development with a moderate level of apartment inventories.
—VNS