Vietnam’s regulations on community living space in apartment buildings

1. Regulations on the arrangement of community living space in apartment buildings

Community living space is part of the common ownership of apartment buildings according to Article 100 of the Law on Housing 2014 of Vietnam. In addition, the law requires apartment buildings to construct and arrange community living spaces according to Clause 10 Article 80 of Decree No. 99/2015/ND-CP of Vietnam’s Government on the handling and transfer of development and management of housing as follows:

- From the effective date of the Law on Housing 2014, i.e. July 01, 2015, every apartment building (including those intended for both residential purpose and other purposes) must have a community house which complies with established standards and regulations.

- With regard to an apartment building that is built before the effective date of the Law on Housing and its design has an area intended to build a community house, the investor must provide an area to build the community house according to the approved design. If its design does not have an area intended to build a community house but has an area for business, the investor and owners may reach an agreement that allows the owners to buy or lease part of such area to build a community house.

- The community house shall be operated by the apartment building management board or apartment building operating unit as decided by the apartment building convention. The community house must be used to serve activities of the community of owners and users of the apartment building. It is prohibited to use the community house to serve personal purposes of owners, users of the apartment building, for lease, lending, or use for purposes other than serving common activities of investors and users thereof.

2. Technical standards for community living space

According to Section 2.2.7 of the QCVN 04:2019/BXD, which is accompanied by Circular No. 21/2019/TT-BXD of the Ministry of Construction of Vietnam on the issuance of national technical standards for apartment buildings, community living space must be arranged to meet the following requirements:

- Apartments and residential portions in mixed-use apartments must assign community space whose average usable area must be at least 0.8 m2/flat, which include appropriate space for organization of inhabitant meetings.

- An apartment complex in a construction project that fails to assign community space in each building may merge community spaces of buildings at a separate location with total area for reduced up to 30%; in that case, distance from lobbies of the buildings to the community space must not exceed 300 m and must be calculated and explained to ensure convenience for the inhabitants.

Thus, the arrangement and construction of community living space for the purpose of communal living of residents must ensure a minimum area as required. This requirement is mandatory for apartment buildings constructed from July 01, 2015 onwards or for those buildings that were constructed earlier but have approved designs for community living spaces. Additionally, community living space is part of the common ownership in apartment buildings and should be used for its intended communal purposes. Individuals or private owners are not allowed to use this space for personal purposes under any circumstances.

Hoa Hong

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