Social housing development is no longer a single goal or independent task of any agency, but is an important political task.
According to the project to invest in building at least 1 million social housing units, the target in the 2021-2025 period is to complete about 428,000 units.
To meet the housing needs of the people, in 2024, the Government assigned the target of completing 130,000 social housing units nationwide. However, in the 2024 summary report, the Ministry of Construction said that the whole country did not complete the above target, only reaching 21,000 social housing units, equivalent to more than 16% of the plan.
At present, although social housing development policies have undergone major changes, access to land funds and local capital sources has not yet had many significant changes and needs more time to adjust.
Lawyer Pham Thanh Tuan - Real estate legal expert - said that, regarding land funds, the 2023 Housing Law requires localities to arrange land funds for social housing development according to the housing development plan.
However, in reality, many localities are still relying on the mandatory 20% land fund in the land fund for commercial housing development, instead of developing their own land fund independently. The creation of separate land funds requires a roadmap and cannot be resolved immediately when the law comes into effect.
Meanwhile, in terms of capital, both investors and social housing buyers currently depend on the VND120,000 billion credit package, but this is not a support package from the state budget but is based on capital from commercial banks.
The loan interest rate is only about 1.5 - 2%/year lower than the normal loan interest rate, not really supporting investors and buyers.
According to lawyer Tuan, when combined with thin profit margins (no more than 10% of total investment) and complicated legal procedures, accessing this preferential capital source becomes even more difficult.
This expert expects that in order to accelerate the development of social housing, in the coming time, it is necessary to (1) focus on developing independent land funds, (2) supplement investment capital into social housing; at the same time, (3) promoting projects using public investment capital is also a good solution, expected to help increase housing supply in the coming time.
Mr. Tuan said that, up to now, the development of social housing is still mainly carried out by private enterprises. Meanwhile, the state budget for social housing construction is still very limited.
Typically, in Hanoi, from 2015 to August 1, 2024, no social housing project has been built using state budget capital.
Therefore, promoting social housing rental projects using public investment capital will contribute to increasing supply and promoting the sustainable development of the social housing market in the future.
In his speech at the groundbreaking ceremony of a social housing project in Lao Cai on December 22, 2024, Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh requested ministries, branches and localities to continue to innovate their working methods, cut down procedures, eliminate the request-grant mechanism, and quickly prepare and implement social housing projects in the direction of promoting decentralization and delegation of power to localities.
Localities continue to plan land and hand over land to investors early. All parties participate in implementing social housing projects in the spirit of harmonious benefits, shared risks, working together, enjoying together, and developing together; absolutely do not take advantage of social housing policies for personal gain, do not distort the very humane policies of our Party and State on social housing development.
