Foreign direct investment (FDI) earmarking for the real estate market hit 692 million USD in the first half of this year, a year-on-year increase of 65 percent, according to CBRE, one of the foreign property service providers in Vietnam.

A number of property projects emerging in the period included Alma Resort worth 300 million USD in central Khanh Hoa province invested by Israel’s Alma Group, a 234 million USD urban area in the western part of West Lake and a 200 million USD apartment building project of Hong Kong ’s Sun Wah Vietnam Real Estate Limited.

This shows that the country’s real estate market is attractive again to foreign investors. Resort projects have proven their advantages while housing ones have seen positive changes, mostly in Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City , with increasing supplies and falling inventories.

In Hanoi , 79 percent of sold apartments were from completed projects. However, CBRE experts said the supply of apartments in Hanoi has not yet met the real demand.

They forecast that the segment of housing for middle income earners will become hot in the remaining months of the year.

From June 16, customers can mortgage the contracts they signed to buy apartments from projects which have had their foundations built to borrow bank loans from the 30 trillion VND loan package.

The Ministry of Finance recently issued Circular 48/2014/TT-BTC guiding the implementation of Governmental Resolution 01/NQ-CP regarding the extension of the payment of land use charges and the cost of buying state-owned housing. The circular took effect on June 10, 2014, allowing many real estate projects to delay the payment of land use charges within 24 months.

In the first six months of 2014, real estate ranked third among all economic sectors in terms of foreign investment attraction with nine new projects registered.-VNA