These barriers make the development of social housing in many localities very slow, not meeting the needs of the people.
It is necessary to shorten the time for implementing administrative procedures and processes
Speaking to reporters, Mr. Le Hoang Chau - Chairman of the Ho Chi Minh City Real Estate Association (HoREA) - emphasized the very worrying issue that from 2020 to present, the high-end housing segment has accounted for the majority of the market, but there is a shortage of low-cost housing and social housing, leading to continuous increases in housing prices and very high prices, beyond the financial capacity of the majority of people with average and low incomes.
From the reality in Ho Chi Minh City, the Ho Chi Minh City Real Estate Association assessed that the biggest bottleneck in developing social housing is the current law enforcement work in implementing administrative processes and procedures for the project.
"The lack of coordination and pushing between departments, branches, districts and towns has led to the handling of administrative procedures for social housing projects being very slow, taking a lot of time, discouraging businesses" - according to the Ho Chi Minh City Real Estate Association.
Based on current legal regulations on social housing, the Association recommends that local People's Committees remove obstacles in the coordination of departments, branches, districts and towns to shorten the time for implementing administrative procedures and procedures on investment and construction of social housing projects. Accordingly, the procedures for approving investment policies need to be consistent with investor approval and approval, adjustment of 1/2,000 scale zoning plans and detailed plans of 1/500 scale.
Taking advantage of preferential loans
Regarding capital sources, Mr. Nguyen Van Dinh - Chairman of the Vietnam Real Estate Brokers Association - assessed that commercial banks have all committed to allocating preferential capital for social housing. However, in reality, businesses and people still face difficulties in capital access procedures, prolonging the disbursement time.
If the loan procedures are quick, there are few accompanying conditions and suitable interest rates, I believe that this credit package will be disbursed faster, helping to boost the supply of social housing, said Mr. Nguyen Van Dinh.
In the same discussion, the representative of the investor of a social housing project in Bac Giang said that cheap capital should be directed to social housing construction enterprises to increase supply to the market. Only when supply increases can housing prices be reduced.
Sharing the same view, Mr. Nguyen Quoc Hung - Vice Chairman and General Secretary of the Vietnam Banking Association commented that currently the capital for social housing is very large, with 145,000 billion VND ready to lend. Investors and businesses need to take advantage of this opportunity to develop social housing, helping middle- and low-income people access suitable housing.
However, experts also pointed out the transparency and legal conditions for projects that need loans. "Projects with complete legal documents and reasonable prices will not have difficulty accessing bank capital. On the contrary, if the business does not have enough financial potential and the application is unclear, it will be very difficult to get a loan approved, said Mr. Hung.
Mr. Hung also emphasized that there cannot be a "handless arrest" - that is, businesses do not have self-made capital, do not have land fund, do not have transparent documents but still want to borrow capital from banks. Enterprises facing difficulties in accessing capital are often enterprises with bad debts or unsatisfactory records.
