The reason why the race to hunt for houses and land becomes fierce

According to statistics from the Ministry of Construction, real estate prices in some localities still tend to increase, especially in Hanoi, Ho Chi Minh City and major cities.

Hanoi is the locality with the most apartment buildings in the country with 1,135 commercial apartment buildings and social housing. Photo: Tuan Anh/VNA

Typically, in Hanoi, apartment prices continue to increase in both new and old projects. The price level of new projects in the third quarter of 2024 increased by 4-6% quarterly and by 22-25% annually. In particular, some areas increased locally by about 35-40% depending on the location compared to the previous quarter.

Among the many causes affecting the recent increase in real estate prices, the Ministry of Construction has also pointed out the phenomenon of "creating virtual prices" and "inflating prices" by speculators and individuals working as real estate brokers, taking advantage of people's lack of knowledge and investing according to the crowd psychology to make profits.

However, the Ministry of Construction also affirmed: These are mainly individuals who work as freelance brokers, do not have real estate brokerage certificates, are weak in expertise, have limited legal knowledge, are unprofessional, and have poor business ethics. This leads to a situation of opportunistic business practices, colluding to raise prices, inflating prices compared to actual values, manipulating the market, causing damage to customers and reducing the transparency of the real estate market.

Faced with social concerns about real estate - the thermometer of the economy, the Vietnam Association of Realtors (VARS) has warned against confusion and equating "real estate brokers" with "real estate brokers". "Real estate" with "speculation". Dr. Nguyen Van Dinh - Chairman of VARS affirmed: Real estate brokers are not the main reason for the price increase in recent times.

According to Mr. Dinh, one of the main reasons mentioned a lot is the severe shortage of affordable housing supply for a long time. Meanwhile, the demand for this segment, both for living and investment, is always high.

“When supply cannot meet demand, demand is compressed and over time, the compression level increases. When the compression reaches a certain limit, it will bounce back and ignore many notes to find supply. This is considered the most important reason why the race to hunt for houses and land is becoming increasingly fierce” – Mr. Dinh analyzed.

Therefore, even the apartment segment, previously considered a "consumer asset", has gone against the trend and increased rapidly in price, regardless of whether it is new or old. Not to mention that all newly launched projects are positioned at the "high-end" level, making the already high price level even higher.

However, the Chairman of VARS also admitted: In that price increase story, it is not excluded that there are cases of speculation, profiteering, taking advantage of the imbalance of supply and demand to hoard goods, inflate prices to surf, and make a difference. But it is necessary to clearly define that this is the speculative behavior of people with finance. This subject is completely different from real estate brokers.

Mr. Dinh especially emphasized: “Avoid equating real estate brokers with speculators because real estate brokers work and receive remuneration from consulting, introducing and closing customers. They do not have enough finance to hold goods and wait for prices to increase. If there are any, the number can be counted on the fingers, not enough to name and describe, let alone the risk of creating waves or monopolizing the market.”

Mr. Nguyen Van Phuc - former Deputy Chairman of the National Assembly's Economic Committee said that in reality, in addition to professional brokers with knowledge, skills, and good compliance with legal regulations, there are still some individual real estate brokers who are influenced by interests, disregard legal regulations, and collude with business investors to "raise" or "depress" market prices. But this phenomenon is certainly inevitable in a market economy.

However, according to Mr. Phuc, the real estate brokerage profession is very important and tightening the conditions for real estate brokerage services is necessary and appropriate. To ensure effective brokerage management, brokers need to participate in professional social organizations, operate independently, and have legal status.

From a business perspective, Mr. Le Dinh Chung - General Director of SGO Homes shared that during the period when the market was frozen and brokers were absent, the whole market called for them to return to work. At present, when the market is better, brokers are blamed for causing prices to skyrocket in some areas.

But in reality, for the real estate market to operate, the role of brokers is indispensable. The trend of increasing real estate prices is inevitable. It is unusual for real estate prices to increase sharply in a short period of time. However, participating in the real estate market includes 3 main subjects: investors, brokers and buyers. If the price increase is attributed entirely to brokers, it is unreasonable.

“Real estate brokers also do not want prices to increase quickly and high. Because when investors sell at high prices, the opportunity to close customers will be more difficult, and brokers will also have a harder time promoting successful transactions to receive remuneration and brokerage fees,” Mr. Chung cited.

Faced with this reality, Mr. Nguyen Chi Thanh - Permanent Vice President of VARS said: New legal regulations on real estate business have eliminated the situation of freely operating brokers, also known as "land brokers".

Real estate brokers today must meet the necessary legal conditions of attending training courses, improving professional knowledge, and passing the real estate brokerage practice certificate exam. At the same time, meeting the sufficient condition is to participate in economic organizations with legal status with conditions.

VARS acts as a professional social organization, representing the real estate brokerage force. To enhance the role and position of the profession, contributing to promoting the market to develop in a safe, healthy and sustainable direction, in recent times, VARS has proactively promoted the dissemination and popularization of new laws on housing, land and real estate business.

In particular, VARS always focuses on the contents related to brokerage services business activities. Currently, VARS is researching and cooperating with professional social organizations in many countries around the world to develop a code of ethics and conduct for real estate brokerage - Mr. Thanh informed.

Source: https://baolaocai.vn/ly-do-khien-cuoc-dua-san-nha-dat-tro-nen-khoc-liet-post393463.html