HCM City in dire need of affordable houses Around 81,000 people in HCM City need accommodation each year in the 2016-2020 period as the city continues to attract people from the countryside, according to the HCM City Real Estate Association (HoREA). HoREA said that the southern metropolis’ current population stands at 13 million, including 500,000 who live in rented apartments. Around 3 million people that have moved to the city for work also need accommodation. However, the supply of apartments of one or two bedrooms priced at around VND1 billion (USD45,000) remains limited.   Around 81,000 people in HCM City need accommodation each year in the 2016-2020 period  Le Hoang Chau, HoREA Chairman said that low-cost housing projects still face many difficulties in implementation related to site clearance and loans, leading to the modest supply. Under current regulations, commercial housing projects of 10ha or more are required to allocate 20% of the land to social housing, which Chau claimed may not be suited to specific projects. He suggested an option that investors can exchange land lots or apartments of equal value at other locations, or pay the required 20% land allocation in cash to localities so that they can use the money so that their upmarket developments would not be affected by low income earners. The State Bank of Vietnam’s Circular 36 issued early 2016 restricts credit in the property market, so lending interest rate for this sector has grown. Chau also noted that it takes investors up to two years to complete procedures for building affordable housing projects, which should be shortened. Besides cheap apartments, investors should also focus on building houses for low-income earners to lease, he said. By Nguyen Tuyen, dtinews.vn