Three laws governing land, housing, and real estate business, which all took effect on August 1, 2024, established a new legal foundation for Vietnam’s property market. Two years later, on July 28, 2026, the 14th Party Central Committee issued Resolution No. 21-NQ/TW, setting out the policy direction for amending the Land Law and related legislation while retaining the relevant principles of Resolution No. 18-NQ/TW, issued in 2022.
Resolution No. 21 is not a new real estate law. Rather, it provides the political and policy framework for the next phase of legal reforms. Yet its directions could reshape Vietnam’s property market over the years to come.
At its core, the Resolution redefines land as more than an object of administrative management. It recognizes it as a strategic development resource, while affirming land-use rights as a protected form of property and a key productive asset within the economy.
Reframing land and housing policy
Several provisions stand out for their potential market impact.
First, the State will continue to regulate and determine land prices, but valuations must be based on data and scientific methodologies, with greater transparency to reduce price manipulation and speculative “artificial” valuations.
Second, land allocation and leasing will rely primarily on auctions of land-use rights and competitive bidding for State-managed land projects, with an emphasis on transparency, competition, and selecting investors capable of using land efficiently.
Third, the Resolution seeks to sharply limit the subdivision and sale of land plots in urban areas, particularly in major cities.
Fourth, it encourages private investment in affordable rental housing through preferential land allocation and leasing policies. Rental housing, social housing, and State-owned public-service housing would also receive long-term land-use tenure.
Fifth, the Resolution calls for new financial and tax policies that make land hoarding more costly than speculative gains. It also proposes higher taxes on vacant and unused land, alongside mechanisms to capture increases in land value.
And sixth, it envisions a more transparent and integrated real estate market by requiring greater public disclosure of planning, project legality, land prices, transactions, financial obligations, mortgages, disputes, and land-use status. Over time, land transactions would become subject to mandatory registration and linked with planning, tax, banking, notarization, and real estate databases.
Resolution No. 21 calls on the State to move beyond compensating people for acquired assets and toward rebuilding lives when land is recovered. The objective is not only to improve housing conditions and livelihoods for displaced residents but also to strengthen every citizen’s ability to secure a place to live through better land policies and a more accessible rental housing market.
Groundwork for the shift
The new directions set out in Resolution No. 21 did not emerge in an institutional vacuum. Vietnam had already embarked on major reform with the three abovementioned laws: the Land Law 2024 (passed by the National Assembly on January 18, 2024), the Law on Housing 2023 (on November 27, 2023), and the Law on Real Estate Business 2023 (on November 28, 2023).
The Laws were initially scheduled to take effect on January 1, 2025. However, the National Assembly later passed Law No. 43/2024/QH15, on June 29, 2024, amending provisions in all three laws and bringing their effective date forward to August 1, 2024. Putting the three laws into effect simultaneously was significant, because land, housing, and real estate business cannot function as three separate markets.
Land is the key input, housing is the product that meets residential needs, and real estate business provides the mechanism for bringing properties and land-use rights to the market. The three are closely interconnected, forming a single value chain. When one link is constrained, the entire process, from project development and supply creation to people’s access to housing, is affected.
Land Law 2024: From management to unlocking resources
The Land Law 2024 provides a critical foundation, not only regulating land management and use but also seeking to unlock and allocate land resources more efficiently for socio-economic development.
One of its major changes was the removal of the land price framework under the Land Law 2013, alongside a redesigned system of land price tables and specific land prices. Land price tables are now based more closely on market principles and can be adjusted, amended, and supplemented annually when necessary.
The Law also expands and clarifies cases involving State land recovery, land allocation and leasing, and changes in land-use purpose, while strengthening decentralization and the delegation of authority alongside inspection and oversight. For the real estate market, these changes directly affect land costs, compensation, site clearance, and project feasibility.
Resolution No. 21, however, makes clear that this process is not yet complete. The new direction is to further refine land pricing based on data, scientific methodologies, and greater transparency. The central government will establish criteria, principles, methodologies, and oversight mechanisms, while local authorities will determine land prices within the legal framework.
This suggests that the land pricing challenge in the next stage will not simply be about “how much” but also about “how the price is determined, what data it is based on, and how the gains from rising land values are distributed.”
Law on Housing 2023: From homeownership to access
While the Land Law focuses on the key input, the Law on Housing focuses on the product and its beneficiaries.
The Law on Housing 2023 devotes a specific chapter to social housing development and expands the groups eligible for housing support. Importantly, it does not eliminate the obligation to allocate land for social housing in commercial housing projects.
Under Article 83, provincial-level People’s Committees must ensure sufficient land for social housing development, in line with approved housing development programs and plans. In Special-Class, Class I, Class II, and Class III urban areas, depending on the circumstances, commercial housing developers may fulfill this obligation by allocating part of their project land for social housing, providing serviced social housing land at another location, or making a payment equivalent to the value of the serviced land required for social housing development.
The key change, therefore, is not the “removal of the 20 per cent requirement” but the diversification of ways developers can fulfill their social housing obligations, alongside greater responsibility for local authorities in planning and land allocation. The Law also provides social housing developers with incentives covering land, taxes, credit, and other forms of support.
Notably, the law provides exemptions from land-use fees and land rental payments for qualifying social housing project land, helping remove a procedural hurdle that has historically contributed to delays in project development.
More importantly, however, the Law on Housing 2023 broadens the policy focus to include rental social housing. This aligns closely with the concept of the “right to secure housing.”
A low-income person does not necessarily need to buy a home immediately to be considered as having access to housing policy. A rental home that is affordable, of adequate quality, and available on stable terms can also provide a meaningful form of housing security.
Law on Real Estate Business 2023: Improving market transparency
The Law on Real Estate Business 2023 introduces a range of provisions aimed at improving transparency and protecting buyers. It requires real estate businesses to publicly disclose complete, truthful, and accurate information about properties and projects offered for sale.
For off-plan housing and buildings, the Law limits developers to collecting a deposit of no more than 5 per cent of the sale or lease-purchase price once the property is legally eligible to be marketed. Deposit agreements must clearly state the sale or lease-purchase price.
The Law also requires real estate businesses to receive customer payments through accounts at credit institutions or foreign bank branches legally operating in Vietnam.
These provisions are intended not only to strengthen control over financial flows but also to curb improper capital raising and make transactions easier to verify. Taken together, the three laws can be viewed as three interconnected layers of the system:
LAND → HOUSING → MARKET
In this context, Resolution No. 21 adds a fourth and more fundamental layer:
LAND → HOUSING → MARKET → HOUSING SECURITY
From homeownership to housing security
For decades, the Vietnamese idea of “settling down and building a career” has been closely tied to owning a home. The logic is understandable. A home is not only a place to live, but also a store of wealth, collateral for credit and, for many households, their most important asset. But as housing prices rise faster than incomes, equating housing security with homeownership is creating a growing paradox.
In a modern urban economy, access to adequate housing does not necessarily require property ownership. This distinction lies at the heart of the difference between owning a home and having housing security. A stronger focus on access to housing would give policymakers a broader set of tools, including social housing for sale, lease-purchase, and rental; affordable commercial housing; long-term rentals; worker housing; dormitories; and other models tailored to different income groups. This is why Resolution No. 21 places specific emphasis on developing affordable rental housing.
Vietnam’s rapid urbanization and increasingly mobile workforce are creating new patterns of housing demand. Workers move to industrial parks. Students head to major cities. Young people relocate to Hanoi, Ho Chi Minh City, Da Nang, or emerging economic centers. Professionals may spend only a few years working in a particular location.
In many of these cases, the immediate need is not to buy a home, but to find decent housing at a predictable cost. Yet Vietnam’s housing market remains heavily geared toward development for sale. As a result, many people rely on a fragmented rental market where quality, safety, services, and lease stability vary widely.
A professional rental housing market could offer a third option between informal lodging and homeownership. One example is Build-to-Rent, where developers build properties specifically for long-term rental rather than selling individual units. Combined with appropriate incentives for land, taxation, credit, and planning, the model could create a new source of housing supply.
Resolution No. 21 points in this direction, calling for preferential land allocation and leasing policies to encourage private sector investment in affordable rental housing. This could become one of the most significant shifts in Vietnam’s housing policy during 2026-2030.
But expanding rental supply alone will not solve the affordability problem. When housing prices rise faster than incomes for an extended period, the gap between the need for housing and the ability to buy it widens. Credit is only part of the answer.
If supply remains constrained by limited land, lengthy procedures, high land costs, and speculation, expanding mortgage access may simply push demand ahead of supply. Tackling housing affordability therefore requires action across the entire chain, from land supply and project costs to housing products and speculative behavior.
Resolution No. 21 identifies several areas for action. It calls for a more data-driven and transparent system for determining land prices; mechanisms to regulate the additional value generated by planning, infrastructure investment, changes in land use, and urban expansion; tax policies to discourage land hoarding, vacant land, and speculation; tighter limits on land subdivision and plot sales in urban areas; and greater disclosure of planning, legal status, land prices, transactions, mortgages, disputes, and financial obligations.
If these measures are implemented coherently, the market could gradually move away from a model driven largely by expectations of rising land prices toward one based more on actual use value and the ability to generate sustainable cash flows.
The shift in thinking also extends to what happens when the State acquires residential land. Resolution No. 21 calls for a move from “compensating for acquired assets” toward “rebuilding people’s lives,” marking an important change in the philosophy of land policy.
If a household whose residential land is acquired is viewed simply as an asset owner entitled to compensation, the process may end with a financial payment. But if that household is seen as having a right to maintain and improve its living conditions, the solution must go further - to include housing, infrastructure, schools, healthcare, employment, livelihoods, and integration into a new community.
Resolution No. 21 also continues to promote the separation of compensation, support, and resettlement into independent projects that can be implemented in advance. Resettlement areas are expected to provide adequate infrastructure and essential services, while giving greater attention to residents’ livelihoods.
Taken together, these measures point to a broader policy shift: housing policy is gradually moving beyond the question of who owns a home toward the more fundamental question of whether people can secure a safe, stable, and affordable place to live.
Redefining “Settling down”
International experience shows there is no single model for achieving housing security. Singapore has built a large-scale public housing system, with the State playing a strong role in land planning, housing development, and financial support. Germany, by contrast, has a relatively low homeownership rate but a highly-developed rental market, allowing people to build stable lives without necessarily owning property.
The two models are very different, but they point to the same conclusion: a high homeownership rate is not the only measure of housing security. What matters is whether people can access housing that fits their income, workplace, family needs, and stage of life.
The lesson is particularly relevant to Vietnam as labor markets become more flexible and urbanization continues. A young professional may rent; a family may lease-purchase social housing; a higher-income household may buy a commercial home; a factory worker may rent near their workplace; and an older person may choose housing suited to their care needs. A diverse housing ecosystem is ultimately more effective than a market where buying is the only path to stability.
If housing security becomes a policy objective, the way the real estate market is assessed must also change. Total investment, project numbers, transaction volumes, and price growth alone cannot show whether housing is meeting people’s needs.
Greater attention should be given to indicators that directly reflect living conditions. The house price-to-income ratio shows how many years of household income are needed to buy a home. The housing cost-to-income ratio should capture not only purchase prices and rent, but also management fees, utilities, transportation, and other costs that determine real affordability.
The share of social and rental housing in total supply also matters. A market dominated by high-end projects is unlikely to address mass-market demand. The distance between housing and employment is equally important: an affordable home far from workplaces can carry significant additional costs in transportation, commuting time, and quality of life.
Housing quality and infrastructure must also be part of the equation. Housing security means more than having a roof over your head. It means access to safe neighborhoods, transportation, schools, healthcare, public spaces, and essential services. Housing policy therefore needs to be considered alongside urban planning, transport, employment, and social welfare.
The three laws established an important legal foundation. The Land Law provides the framework for managing and allocating land resources; the Law on Housing shapes housing and social housing policy; and the Law on Real Estate Business sets the rules governing the market and transactions.
Resolution No. 21 adds another layer: land should be used more efficiently, markets should become more transparent, speculation should be better controlled, and resources should be directed toward genuine economic and social needs. Its emphasis on affordable rental housing is particularly significant, suggesting that housing policy is beginning to move beyond a traditional focus on homeownership.
This could prove an important shift. A modern economy cannot expect every worker to own a home before they can establish a stable life. A newly-graduated engineer may need to rent. A factory worker may need housing near their workplace. A foreign professional may only need accommodation for a few years. A young family may need to rent before it can afford to buy. Housing, therefore, is not simply an asset. It is also infrastructure that enables people to live, work, raise families, and sustain their livelihoods.
Seen from this perspective, the ultimate measure of the real estate market is not how much housing prices rise, how large market capitalization becomes, or how many high-end projects are launched. The more important measure is whether people can find safe, stable, and well-serviced housing they can afford.
A new phase
The simultaneous implementation of the Land Law 2024, the Law on Housing 2023, and the Law on Real Estate Business 2023 on August 1, 2024, marked a major step in strengthening Vietnam’s real estate institutions. Law No. 43 provided the legal basis for bringing the three laws into effect earlier than originally scheduled, but two years of implementation have shown that legal reform is not the endpoint.
Resolution No. 21, issued on July 28, 2026, opens a new phase in land and real estate policy, placing land more firmly within the broader context of economic growth, resource allocation, social equity, and quality of life.
From reforming land valuation and compensation to tightening controls on land subdivision and speculation; from building integrated land and real estate databases to improving transaction transparency; and from expanding social and rental housing to shifting from compensating for assets toward rebuilding the lives of people affected by land acquisition, the Resolution points to a common objective: putting people at the center of land and housing policy.
The shift from property ownership to housing security does not diminish the importance of ownership, but instead broadens the concept of what it means to have a secure home in a rapidly-changing urban society.
People can achieve housing security through a home they own. But they can also find it in a stable long-term rental, a social housing unit, an affordable apartment, or a resettlement home that provides adequate living conditions and sustainable livelihoods.
The goal of “everyone having a home” can therefore be understood more broadly. It does not necessarily mean that everyone must become a property owner. It means that everyone should have access to housing that is suitable, safe, stable, and affordable. That may be the most important shift Resolution No. 21 opens up for Vietnam’s housing policy in the years ahead.
When housing returns to its fundamental role as economic and social infrastructure serving people, the real estate market can become more than a vehicle for asset accumulation. It can become part of the country’s broader development infrastructure. And when people can achieve housing security without having to “buy at any cost,” the property market will have a greater chance of shifting from growth driven by asset prices toward growth built on use value, better cities, and a higher quality of life.
Housing quality and infrastructure must also be part of the equation. Housing security means more than having a roof over your head. It means access to safe neighborhoods, transportation, schools, healthcare, public spaces, and essential services. Housing policy therefore needs to be considered alongside urban planning, transport, employment, and social welfare.
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