On 14 February 2020, Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment has issued the Official Dispatch No.703/BTNMT-TCQLDD (the “Official Dispatch No.703”) on guideline the regime of land use and granting the Certificate of the ownership of non-residential construction work, is known widely as initial specialized opinions in order to grant the Pink book for the apartment, construction works with the purpose of accommodation business (“Condotel”). Accordingly, this is considered as a positive signal for real estate market in general and for the enterprises, the investors in particular.

However, nearly six (06) months has passed, the Condotel buyers have not been granted the Pink book. Recognizing the shortcomings of the Condotel’s legality, Real Estate Association of Ho Chi Minh City (“HoREA”) has just sent the proposal letter to the Prime Ministry as well as the relevant ministries, departments regarding completion the legal framework for Condotel. Accordingly, the notable issues are mentioned by HoREA in the proposal letter including the following issues:

1. Use consistently the definition of Tourist apartment instead of accommodation apartment in the Circulars No.21/2019/TT-BXD dated on 31 December 2019 regarding promulgation of national technical regulations on condominiums;

2. Propose the Ministry of Construction to promulgate the national technical regulations on Tourist apartments in the resort projects. Because the Tourist apartments are not only the apartments that are located in the mixed condominiums but also located in the independent building belong to the resort projects;

3. Agree with the viewpoint of the Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment regarding granting the Pink book for Tourist apartment, concurrently, propose to supplement the case of granting the Pink book with the using duration for the tourist townhouse (Tourist Boutique, Shoptel in the resorts) at the Official Dispatch No.703 and supplement the tourist townhouse type at the Article 48 Law on Tourist for unifying the management;

4. Propose the Ministry of Construction to offer the Prime Ministry regulating the calculation of the area of the private ownership, general ownership of the Tourist apartment as a basis for granting the Certificate of the ownership of non-residential construction work to customer;

5. Propose to supplement the phrase “except for the tourist apartment, tourist villa owned by themselves under the same project”, at point a clause 1 Article 4 of the Regulation on management, business of tourist apartment and tourist villa (the “Regulation”) attached with the Decision No 3720/QD-BVHTTDL  issued by the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism, accordingly: “a) The organizations, individuals running the business of the tourist accommodation service regarding tourist apartment, villa apartment owned by themselves or having legal right to use, except for the tourist apartment, tourist villa owned by themselves under the same project”; and

6. Propose to supplement the tourist accommodation establishment which is farmstay – rural experience tourist area at Article 48 Law on Tourism to unify the management and amend the Regulation in order for supplement the operational management system for farmstay.

Thus, although there is no official legal documents regarding the procedure of granting the Pink book for Condotel, the contributing opinions have helped (i) clarify the definition of non–residential apartment, namely using the definition of “Tourist apartment”, Tourist townhouse”, …; (ii) clarify the using duration of the Pink book comply with the land use duration (50 years or 70 years depending on the cases respectively) to distinguish it from granting the Pink book for the residential apartment (long term duration); (iii) suggest the calculation of the area of the private ownership, general ownership as a basis for granting the Pink book; and (iv) provide the suggestion regarding the new type of tourist accommodation establishment which is farmstay in order to timely adjust this new type, concurrently, build the initial legal framework to solve the output of the products of resort project and solve the problem for the resort real estate market currently.