Hundreds of thousands of Viet Kieu (overseas Vietnamese) return to Vietnam in January or February each year to celebrate Tet in their former homeland. Typically, that’s also a time for them to find and purchase houses in Vietnam. This year, however, reports Saigon tiep thi, it seems that the number of Viet Kieu who plan to buy houses here is rather modest.

Officially, only ten Viet Kieu bought houses here last year

According to the HCM City Committee for Overseas Vietnamese, a lot of Viet Kieu, especially Viet Kieu from the US and Western Europe, have come recently to ask about the procedures to purchase houses in Vietnam. However, the ‘open door policy’ on allowing Viet Kieu to purchase houses in Vietnam has not yet created a buying wave.

According to Tran Hoa Phuong, Deputy Chairman of the HCM City Committee for Overseas Vietnamese, since 2006, only about 140 Viet Kieu have purchased houses in Vietnam.  One hundred of these were in HCM City.

In 2009, only ten Viet Kieu are officially recorded as buying houses in Vietnam, mostly in HCM City. These numbers are clearly ‘modest’ relative to the more than four million Viet Kieu living abroad.

Pham Quang Hai, Head of the Real Estate Transaction Division from Vinaland Phu My Hung confirms that very few Viet Kieu used his company as a consultant on real estate purchases last year.

“Many people asked for information but they did not buy,” he said, adding that in previous years, many Viet Kieu purchased houses at the Phu My Hung project in South Saigon, including some who bought five or six houses as rental properties.

The director of a HCM City real estate company believes that the global economic crisis has reduced the incomes of Viet Kieu.  Therefore, they have less to spend on purchasing houses or making investments in Vietnam.

The director said problems in the policies relating to real estate trading have discouraged many potential buyers.

The case of Nguyen Hang My Hoa, now living at 224 My Kim 1 Street in Phu My Hung, typifies the complicated policies relating to Viet Kieu house purchases.

Hoa bought her villa in 2002, but in her nephew’s name. “The policy was so complicated, while I really wanted to have a house to live because I decided to return to Vietnam. I had no choice but to use my nephew’s name,” she said.

Finally, Hoa’s name was written down in the house purchase documents after she regained Vietnamese citizenship in 2003.  However, Hoa is still waiting for her house ownership certificate.

Though official statistics show that only a modest number of houses have been sold to Viet Kieu, the number of houses owned they own is in reality relatively big. Real estate brokerage offices in Phu My Hung say that almost all Viet Kieu buyers continue to purchase homes in the names of their relatives.

Still awaiting guidance

Chairman Ngo Duong Hoang Thao of Dai Dong Duong Consulting and Investment Company observes that a large number of Viet Kieu have assets of upwards of five hundred thousand to one million dollars.  For them, Vietnamese real estate is a favored investment.

“The profitability of real estate investments is really attractive. Further, if they buy houses in Vietnam, Viet Kieu will have houses to live in when they return here,” Thao explained

Thao notes that notwithstanding the expansion of the right to purchase houses in a law passed by the National Assembly last June, there are still some unclear provisions in the policies relating on Viet Kieu house ownership.

The current laws specifically allow virtually any Viet Kieu to purchase houses, but don’t mention purchasing land. “Can Viet Kieu purchase land and then build houses themselves, then? There is no guidance about this.”

Phuong, the HCM City official, points out that the Government has yet to issue concrete guidance to officials who implement the new policy on Viet Kieu house purchases, though the law went into force on July 1, 2009.

Typically, he said, Viet Kieu do not know which agencies they need to contact to obtain necessary documents to be able to purchase houses.

VietNamNe/SGTT

The DFJ VinaCapital Fund on Jan. 28 signed a contract with TS24 Company to become its strategic partner.

The fund will contribute 2 million USD to help the investors improve its data and management systems, and its human resources.

It will also help diversify services, including tax declaration and payments on its Tax Online website.

The company will be able to prepare financial reports and deal with taxes on personal and corporate income, value-added taxes, natural resources and special consumption.

TS24 general director Nguyen Phan Viet Thuy said he was confident in the potential market of more than 10 million individuals with tax codes and another 500,000 enterprises.

It has signed an agreement with the card company with the card company DongA Bank VNBC for taxpayers to use cards issued by DongA Bank and other banks who join its ATM network for online payments.

DFJ VinaCapital, a 32 million USD joint venture between the IT group Draper Fisher Jurvetson and VinaCapital, specialises in making investments in the internet, telecommunications and media businesses.

Apart from this fund, VinaCapital also manages three others, the Vietnam Opportunity Fund (VOF), VinaLand Ltd (VNL) and Vietnam Infrastructure (VNI), which are listed at the Alternative Investment Market (AIM) of the London Stock Exchange.

The announcement was released after MATRADE has conducted a far reaching survey on Vietnam’s business environment.

Earlier, during a working visit to HCM City from December 15-17, several Malaysian businesses completed franchise negotiations with a total investment value of up to US$1.35 million.

According to MATRADE, this is the first time Malaysian franchise businesses have visited Vietnam with the aim of tapping into the market as the country has a young population, is politically stable and has recorded a continuous growth rate over the past few years.

Established in 1993, MATRADE is under the Malaysian Ministry of International Industry and Trade. This agency is responsible for supporting Malaysian businesses to export and invest into international markets by providing them with a consultancy and trade support services as well as training international marketing skills for exporters.

Vietnam is likely to earn US$1.8 billion from exports to the UK this year as there have been positive signs in the country’s export turnover, said Vietnamese trade counsellor to the UK, An The Dung.

This year, despite the impact of the global economic crisis, Vietnam-UK economic and trade relations have developed well through the exchange of high-level visits, meetings among businesses of both countries and trade promotion programmes. Around 60 Vietnamese delegations have made fact-finding tours of the UK.

According to a recent report released by the UK Trade and Investment (UKTI), Vietnam is considered as one of 17 major markets of UK businesses. Under another survey on selecting markets for future trade and investment activities, Vietnam is listed among 15 markets which are seen as lucrative to foreign investors.

Dung quoted the UK’s Statistics Agency as saying as of October 2009, the UK’s import turnover from Vietnam reached GBP893 million, up 7.4 percent against the same period last year. Its export turnover to Vietnam was GBP171 million, up 12 percent. Total import-export turnover in 10 months reached GBP1.064 billion, up 7.4 percent from a year earlier.

Thanh Nam Investment and Construction Joint Stock Co (Cotana— HNX-coded CSC) officially started the construction works of a 21-storey building of apartments, trade centres and offices at 671 Hoang Hoa Tham St, Hanoi on December 26, 2009.

The Infrastructure Investment and Development Co, under Viglacera Corp was the project’s main investor. It’s considered the first project to start a series of projects in Cotana’s business plan in 2010.

The total value for the project was 114 billion dong. It’s expected that the construction works for this bidding package conducted by Cotana will last for 450 working days,, starting from the date when the investor hands over the ground for the contractor.

Intercontinental Hotels Group will build the group’s first Holiday Inn franchise in Viet Nam’s capital city of Ha Noi.

The MB Real Estate Joint Stock Company (MBLand) completed legal procedures for the project.

Scheduled to open in 2013, the new hotel will be part of the MBLand’s tower and mixed-development complex that will house hotels, offices and a commercial centre. The complex will be located on Chua Boc Street, Dong Da District.

The 9,400sq.m tower will include 21 floors on a construction area of 75,000sq.m.

As planned, three traffic routes that link the big streets of Truong Chinh, Xa Dan and Nguyen Luong Bang will be built around the tower.

A subway station will also be set up at Chua Boc Street, in front of the MBLand tower. The station, if built, would help ease traffic congestion in the street.

The construction is expected to begin early next year.

The opening of the franchise will meet the growing demand for hotel rooms in Ha Noi. The city is expected to attract 2 million international travellers and 7 million domestic visitors next year.

VietNamNet/Viet Nam News

Transport officials from Southeast Asia (ASEAN) will meet in Hanoi from December 7-11 to step up road links and open transport services among member countries.

The meetings are expected to produce major treaties and agreements to pave the way for the establishment of the ASEAN Economic Community by 2015.

They include the Multilateral Agreement for the Full Liberalization of Passenger Air Services (MAFLPAS) and ASEAN Transit Transportation.

In addition, Japan and South Korea as dialogue countries of ASEAN will approve other deals with the block as ASEAN-Korea Transport Cooperation Agreement, ASEAN-Korea Transport Partnership Work Plan, and an agreement to jointly investigate marine accidents.

The meetings are part of the 28th ASEAN Senior Transport Officials Meeting (STOM 28) that are held twice a year and the 15th annual meeting of ASEAN Transportation Ministers (ATM15).

Ba Ria – Vung Tau province started the construction of the Cai Mep – Thi Vai road connecting all seaports along the Thi Vai river on December 4.

The project has a total investment of over VND 6.3 trillion.

The 21.3 kilometre road runs from the general container port Cai Mep Ha in Tan Thanh district, Ba Ria – Vung Tau province to the Phuoc An port in Long Thanh district, Dong Nai province.

Six bridges, 4.7 kilometre in combined length, will be built on the road.

The project is divided into two phases. In the first phase, the road and bridges in Ba Ria – Vung Tau province will be built with a total investment of over VND 2.8 trillion. This phase is scheduled to be over by 2012. In the second phase from 2012 to 2015, the 3.254 kilometre long Phuoc An bridge will be built with a total investment of over VND 3.5 trillion

The road is of extreme important significance in transporting goods for 41 ports (14 ports are being exploited, 14 others are being built and 13 remaining ports are being prepared to invest with a total registered capital of around VND 100 trillion) and six industrial parts along the road section in Ba Ria – Vung Tau.