Explaining to the National Assembly about the policy orientation for amending the Real Estate Business Law (August 22), Minister of Construction Tran Hong Minh admitted a very noteworthy reality, although not new, that in recent years, house prices in some segments have "increased too high".
One of the reasons pointed out by the minister is the unreasonable supply structure. The market is lacking commercial housing in the mid-range and low-end segments, lacking social housing and rental housing, but there is a surplus in the high-end housing segment.
That shortage creates conditions for speculation, buying and selling, creating artificial scarcity and continuing to push house prices up.
Looking directly at the issue of speculation is necessary, because behind the figures of real estate price increases is the increasing gap between the price of a house and the accumulation capacity of many workers.
A fairly common reality with the real estate market is that a part of the buying and selling activities in the market is speculative, when assets are bought mainly to wait for price increases instead of meeting actual usage needs.
Through each transaction round, the price of those apartments is often added a difference. And then in the end, people who really need a house to live in may have to pay a price that has been pushed up several times.
That is the reason for combating real estate speculation, in addition to market regulation factors, it is also a solution to create more opportunities to access housing for low-income people.
Of course, speculation is not the only reason for high house prices. Because real estate prices currently have to "carry" many costs, from land use fees, compensation for site clearance, infrastructure construction to financial costs incurred during the waiting time for procedures, management, sales and taxes. Therefore, to bring house prices closer to people's affordability, it is necessary to simultaneously solve both sides.
One side is to increase real supply, especially commercial housing with prices suitable for the average income of society, social housing and rental housing. Along with that is to remove backlog projects, shorten procedures, and reduce unreasonable costs that are being included in the cost price.
The other side is to limit speculation and hoarding of real estate to wait for price increases to distort the market.
Another noteworthy point is that the Ministry of Construction said that tools such as taxes, credit, and planning will be studied as solutions to limit speculation and direct capital flows into real housing needs.
This is necessary because when a person can own many houses, leaving them vacant for a long time without having to bear significant additional costs, real estate can easily become a channel for speculation and accumulation.
The more houses are bought to keep, to leave them empty, waiting for price increases, the opportunity to access housing for people with real needs is narrowed.
Combating speculation is not to drag down house prices by any means, but to create a market with appropriate supply, reasonable prices, and transparent data so that more and more people are able to buy houses.
A transparent market on data will help limit prices being led by rumors, unverified information and unusual transactions.
When the house is first bought to live in, instead of becoming a commodity passed through many people to make a difference, people's housing opportunities will also be wider.
