HCM City mulls closer oversight of rental housing to ensure fire safety

Accommodation for rent in HCM City. The city is considering tightening management of private housing to ensure fire safety. – VNA Photo

HCM CITY – The HCM City Department of Construction has proposed new guidelines for leased apartments to improve safety and generally tighten oversight.

At a press conference yesterday, department officials said they have submitted the proposals to the People’s Committee for approval.

Lê Thị Loan, the department’s deputy head of personnel, said the minimum floor area has to be 5m2 per person to limit the number of occupants per room and building and ensure safety.

The alley outside the building has to be at least 3m wide so that fire trucks could enter or the building has to be no more than 100m away from a large road so that water hoses can be deployed from there.

Every room inside the building has to have access to the main corridor so that people can escape easily in an emergency.

The department also proposes keeping track of rental housing on a management application, which will also help lessees get information about housing availability.

HCM City currently has around 60,500 private housing buildings with 560,220 rooms for rent and 1,4 million tenants.

There have been cases of violations, such as house owners renting rooms to students without registering them or increasing the number of occupants without approval from fire safety agencies.

Around 12,800 buildings are thought to be too unsafe and requiring renovations to meet safety standards.

Loan admitted that rental rooms provided in private housing are among the main accommodation options for low-income people, with demand from students and workers being very high.

Her department is working with localities and might tweak provisions if needed, she said.

Lý Thanh Long, the department’s chief of office, said though the amendments do not require small landlords to establish a business, they need to declare and pay income tax.

This year there have been numerous fires in apartment buildings in the city that have caused several deaths. – VNS