On November 7, Mr. Nguyen Toan Thang, Director of the Department of Natural Resources and Environment of Ho Chi Minh City, said that he had just signed document No. 11663 to send to the Ho Chi Minh City Land Registration Office, branches of the land registration office to rectify the inspection of the current status of houses and construction works when handling procedures for registering changes in land.
According to the Department of Natural Resources and Environment, the current Land Law stipulates that the agency handling administrative procedures on land is responsible for implementing the correct authority and time as prescribed by law. It is not responsible for the contents of documents and papers in the file that have been previously approved, assessed, ratified or resolved by other competent authorities.
Decree No. 101/2024 also stipulates that for properties that are houses and construction works attached to land that have been certified for ownership on the issued certificate (red book), when handling the registration change procedure, the land registration office or branch of the land registration office shall carry out the registration based on the information about the property on the issued red book, except in cases where people and businesses request to register changes to the property. People and businesses are responsible before the law for the implementation of transactions if the property has changed compared to the issued red book.
The agency receiving the dossier and the agency handling the procedures only do not receive the dossier or stop handling the procedures for registering land and assets attached to land and return the dossier to the people and enterprises when requested to stop by the competent authority. Decree No. 101/2024 also does not stipulate that the branch of the land registration office conducts status checks when handling the procedures for registering changes.
In addition, according to Decision No. 17/2024 of the Ho Chi Minh City People's Committee on the regulations for coordinating the management of construction order in the area, the responsibility for managing construction order is determined to be under the authority of the Department of Construction, the People's Committees at the district level, and the People's Committees at the commune level. The responsibility for inspecting and detecting violations of construction order belongs to the officers, civil servants, and inspectors assigned to manage construction order.
According to the leader of the Department of Natural Resources and Environment of Ho Chi Minh City, based on the above regulations, for properties that are houses and construction works attached to land that have been certified for ownership on the issued red book, the Ho Chi Minh City Land Registration Office and its branches will handle registration change files based on information about the property on the issued red book (except in cases where people request to register changes to the property).
The verification of the current status of houses and construction works that are illegally constructed or unlicensed is not specified in the procedures for registration of changes and is not part of the functions and duties of the land registration office.
Not accepting applications or stopping the processing of land registration procedures, assets attached to land and returning applications to people if there are construction violations will be carried out when requested by competent authorities and must comply with the provisions of Decree 101/2024.
However, recently, the Department of Natural Resources and Environment has received a lot of information reflecting that some branches of land registration offices still check the status when handling procedures for registration of changes to houses and construction works attached to land that have been certified for ownership on the red book. This is an additional procedure, not in accordance with the administrative reform policy and not in accordance with regulations, causing inconvenience to organizations and individuals.
Therefore, Mr. Nguyen Toan Thang, Director of the Department of Natural Resources and Environment of Ho Chi Minh City requested the City Land Registration Office and branches of land registration offices in districts, towns and Thu Duc city to comply with regulations when handling registration files for changes in houses and construction works attached to land that have been certified for ownership on the certificate.
