One-bedroom HCMC apartment costs more than a quarter million dollars

The apartment commanding a price of VND150 million per square meter is located near the Thu Thiem Tunnel and is the smallest accommodation in the project.

A two-bedroom-two-bathroom apartment is priced VND10-16 billion, while a three-bedroom-three-bathroom affair costs around VND25 billion, or more than a million U.S. dollars.

Penthouses with three to five bedrooms, meanwhile, cost VND33-130 billion.

In another project with a river view, an apartment costs VND170-190 million per square meter.

Chau, a property broker in eastern HCMC, said that in some projects that have not yet launched, the smallest apartment (50 square meters) costs around VND9 billion. For the same price, a buyer can get his or her hands on nearly four two-bedroom apartments in the middle segment in Thu Duc City (costing VND2.4 billion each on average).

Chau said prices have been surging on the Thu Thiem Peninsula since the land auction last December.

Sellers have been pushing prices up to new heights as the peninsula has infrastructure linking it with the financial hub of District 1, he said.

The VND6 billion price tag for the smallest apartment in Thu Thiem might sound too expensive to the average buyer, but properties on the peninsula are meant for rich or ultra-rich people, said Nguyen Mac Hoai Nam, CEO of property developer Nam Phat.

Around 1% of the population, or one million people, had assets worth VND6 billion or more last year, and the figure could increase this year, he added.