After many years of saving, Mr. Nguyen Minh Toan (Bac Ninh) and his wife have saved more than 2 billion VND to buy a house and land in Hanoi. In addition to the savings, Mr. Toan and his wife were supported with an additional 2 billion VND from both sides of their paternal and maternal family and planned to buy a small house in the alley to facilitate work and transfer their children's schools to the capital.
Mr. Toan hopes that with the support of his family and the efforts of the couple over the years, he will have a satisfactory family. However, Mr. Toan was surprised that at that time, there were old residential areas, almost only land.
"With a financial level of 4 billion VND, the consulting broker confirmed that there are no more real estate houses. If there is, it is a house without a red book or a collective house. A level 4 house selling land has a determined area of less than 30m2" - Mr. Toan said.
A typical example is a small house in a 3-way alley in Khuong Trung, Thanh Xuan area of only 22m2 but is being advertised for sale at nearly 5 billion VND, equivalent to more than 220 million VND/m2. The house has 2 floors and 2 bedrooms, 3.6m frontage, 2m entrance road.
Although the area is small and the houses are old and degraded, the plot of land is square, with a 5-storey construction permit, so the above price is still considered "rarely available".
At the same price, in central areas such as Dong Da and Ba Dinh, the house area is only from 12-25m2, ranging from 3 - 5 floors.
Ms. Hai Yen - an apartment and residential real estate broker in Hanoi - commented that at this time, the number of customers interested in apartments and houses in alleys in Hanoi is the same. However, with houses located deep in small alleys, people's demand has decreased significantly.
"Land-based houses are also expensive but there are still suitable houses, at this time they can't buy them, but later there will be more affordable houses than they will buy. The number of visitors to see the house on the ground is still steady. However, currently, buying a residential house depends on the seller, no longer depends on the buyer. They will buy a house that suits their finances with as much money as they have" - Ms. Yen said.
According to Ms. Yen, the apartment price is over 100 million VND/m2, so the price of houses in alleys also fluctuates from 200-300 million VND/m2. Some houses have red books, some have to be bought and sold in the form of notarized documents.
Taking the example of a beautiful house in an alley in Thanh Xuan area, Hanoi with an area of 30m2, the price must be from 7 billion VND, Ms. Yen stated: "The house is built for living, the house is not new, the image on the website is an illustrative photo, the outside will be older. The area in the book is 31m2 but the usable area is 34m2. The price the owner is offering is 7.3 billion, the alley is airy, spacious, and small cars will go to the common gate of the townhouses".
Looking at the current reality, Ms. Hai Yen believes that without help from the family, young people will not have the opportunity to own real housing. Meanwhile, some commercial banks have just adjusted their interest rates up.
"Previously, the market was better, the prices were affordable, and I also had a more stable income. At this time, the price is high, I just work in a bank, making it even more difficult for real buyers. Although housing is still needed, buyers tend to switch to renting, reducing the pressure to buy a house" - Ms. Yen frankly shared.
