A member company of Saigon Thuong Tin Real Estate JSC (TTC Land) in January bought Tin Nghia Corporation’s 51 per cent ownership of Tin Nghia-A Chau Investment JSC. Although the value of the deal was not disclosed, through this acquisition, TTC Land becomes the sole owner of the Centrial Island complex.

Picture is vibrant for 2025 real estate deals, Photo: Shutterstock

Centrial Island is a 48-hectare development including residential, service, and tourism areas located in the southern province of Dong Nai, located among key economic regions and a gateway for economic trade in the southern region.

Also, one month ago, TTC Land announced a plan to issue bonds to seek cooperation in investing the Vinh Dam Complex in the southern island of Phu Quoc, with total investment of about $143 million.

Tran Anh Group has also announced that it wants to offer for sale two projects in the Mekong Delta province of Long An and Ho Chi Minh City. Specifically, a townhouse and villa development venture is located across 32ha in Long An with a selling price of more than $8 million. In Ho Chi Minh City, a 2,000sq.m high-rise housing development located in District 7 has been offered at $3.2 million.

According to Nguyen Van Dinh, vice chairman of the Vietnam Real Estate Association, new land laws that took effect in 2024 have improved conditions for implementing merger and acquisition (M&A) transactions, removing difficulties for both sellers and buyers.

“With the new laws, the upcoming real estate market will be a playground exclusively for investors with real capacity. Weak investors will be eliminated through the screening process. In 2025-2026, the real estate M&A market is expected to be more vibrant with more diverse and quality products,” Dinh said.

Cushman & Wakefield’s country head Bui Trang forecasts that a large amount of capital from foreign investors will be poured into the Vietnamese real estate market over the next two years.

“Investors from Singapore, Malaysia, and Japan will likely continue to dominate the market,” Trang said. “Many transactions have been and are being negotiated with positive results. The investment goal of foreign investors still lies in finding clean land funds, with good quality and real value, as well as complete legal status and lots of development potential.”

In particular, the development of industry and manufacturing has created great demand for industrial land, especially in the context that Vietnam is becoming one of the region’s major production centres.

“Industrial parks in Binh Duong, Dong Nai, and Ba Ria-Vung Tau provinces pull in many foreign investors, especially from Japan and South Korea. This helps develop regional infrastructure and creates many job opportunities for local workers. In addition, the housing segment also witnessed strong development,” Trang added.

The hotel segment also recorded many M&A deals, especially in tourist cities such as Danang and Nha Trang. “The development of the tourism industry has created great demand for high-end accommodation facilities, attracting the attention of domestic and foreign investors,” Trang said.

David Jackson, general director of Avison Young Vietnam, said that exploration and negotiation activities in the market showed that, whether there was a transaction or not, Vietnam remained an attractive destination for foreign capital flows with high interest.

“However, the tension between buyers and sellers will last for at least the next few quarters because new regulations related to real estate need time to be applied consistently and widely,” said Jackson.

He pointed out the two biggest legal problems in real estate M&A were that many projects had expired due to slow implementation. “The extension and re-approval of planning takes quite a lot of time, especially in the context that many localities are reviewing the construction progress of projects in the area that are being wasted,” he said.

Furthermore, when applying the new land price list, the plan to calculate land use fees has not been agreed between the seller and the buyer.

“The number of M&A deals I see remains relatively high in 2025, but it is not yet at a boom level. The main segments will continue to be industry and logistics, commercial housing, offices and complex projects,” he said.

Closing 2024, Vietnam’s real estate M&A market recorded growth with 13 noteworthy deals reaching a total of $1.8 billion, with the participation of enterprises such as CapitaLand Develoment, Keppel, Mapletree Logistics, Vingroup, Becamex IDC, and Novaland.