Developers rush to build homes on Vietnam’s breathtaking coast, testing a new urban model
These large-scale, seafront projects are eyeing long-term residents rather than tourists
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FROM Ha Long Bay to Can Gio, Vietnam’s next generation of seaside real estate is beginning to look less like a collection of beach resorts and more like a chain of new cities spanning thousands of hectares along the country’s long coastline.
Vietnam’s largest developer, Vinhomes, a unit of Vingroup, is developing nearly 160,000 residential units in three major coastal projects in Quang Ninh, Da Nang and the south of Ho Chi Minh City.
Its peer, Sun Group, is also expanding mixed residential, resort and commercial developments near well-known beaches such as those in Thanh Hoa, Nha Trang and Vung Tau.
Smaller developers are making a similar bet. HAUS’ Coastal Quang Ngai, for example, sits on a lot nearly 94 hectares in size near My Khe Beach in central Vietnam, and is designed as a permanent residential community for roughly 4,000 people.
Nguyen Hoai An, senior director of CBRE Vietnam’s Hanoi branch, described this as a shift from hospitality-led coastal products aimed primarily at investors towards large-scale townships designed for long-term living in provincial markets.
“These projects are increasingly designed to serve both local owner-occupiers and urban residents seeking second-home opportunities,” she said, pointing to a more diversified demand profile of newer coastal townships than pure-play resort projects.
This also occurs as Vietnam’s property market is caught between recovering supply and weaker demand from both end-users and investors facing high mortgage rates.
From resorts to cities
The shift comes as Vietnam’s economy expands rapidly and infrastructure pushes the effective boundaries of its largest cities outward.
Michael Sheren, who chairs the board at HAUS, explained why the developer chose Quang Ngai, a central province that remains far less developed than nearby Da Nang:
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“If you’re a football player, you want to kick the ball not to where the person is, but where the person is going to be,” he said in an interview with The Business Times.
HAUS expects airport development, deep-water port capacity and expanding road links to support economic growth, drawing more people and investment into the province.
“It’s really built for the local community first and foremost,” he said, describing plans for shops, schools and playgrounds alongside housing. “The primary focus is around people who are going to live in the community.”
That distinction matters because Vietnam has already experienced what happens when coastal real estate expands faster than underlying demand.
The country’s previous beachfront boom was dominated by condotels, villas and hospitality projects sold heavily to investors. Some later struggled with legal complications, delayed construction or weaker-than-expected tourism economics.
Rather than rely mainly on seasonal tourism, developers are now targeting a broader mix of buyers: local owner-occupiers and second-home buyers from Hanoi, Ho Chi Minh City and nearby provinces.
They are also adding schools, healthcare, commercial facilities and employment components from the outset to build the year-round economic base that pure-play resort developments typically lack, said An.
The occupancy test
Vietnam is hardly alone in trying to turn resort destinations into places where people can live year-round.
Phuket and Bali combine strong tourism markets with substantial second-home, villa and expatriate demand, supported by air connectivity, destination marketing and lifestyle infrastructure; Thailand and Malaysia also offer long-stay residency frameworks that attract foreign residents.
An said Vietnam could eventually benefit from the arrival of more foreign residents as it emerges as a retirement destination. The country appeared for the first time on Forbes’ 2026 list of the best places to retire abroad, with Hanoi, Da Nang, Ho Chi Minh City and Hoi An among the destinations named.
But capturing that demand would require clearer long-stay rules, better access to international-standard healthcare and greater certainty for foreign buyers, she said.
Vietnam currently caps foreign ownership at 30 per cent of residential units in a condominium building and 250 landed homes within a ward-equivalent area.
That means the near-term success of Vietnam’s coastal cities will still depend overwhelmingly on domestic demand – and ultimately on whether buyers actually move in.
Vinhomes’ Green Paradise in Can Gio, a coastal suburb south of Ho Chi Minh City, is perhaps the biggest test. The project, being developed as a self-contained urban destination, will offer roughly 114,000 low- and high-rise units spread over more than 2,800 hectares.
Global Gate Ha Long in Quang Ninh offers a northern version of the same thesis, with about 39,500 units sitting on more than 6,200 hectares, and with access to an existing industrial, tourism and logistics economy.
Vingroup companies are undertaking strategic infrastructure that could improve access and support the long-term value of its developments. They include the Ben Thanh-Can Gio and Hanoi-Quang Ninh high-speed railways, which will directly connect Vinhomes projects to downtown Ha Noi and Ho Chi Minh City.
But turning the projects into lived-in townships could be a challenge.
“Investor-driven demand still clearly outweighs owner-occupier demand for these developments at this stage,” An said, adding that “genuine permanent residents remain a small minority for now”.
“The main variable to watch going forward is the pace of execution,” she said, referring to infrastructure, amenities and local economic activity.
Developers have time to strategise. CBRE estimates that less than 10 per cent of the residential units in the large developments it monitors have been rolled out since 2025, because supply is being released in phases.
Among Vinhomes’ three coastal projects, for example, about 63 per cent of planned residential units have yet to be sold or even pre-sold; in fact, sales and revenue recognition are expected to extend as far down the road as 2043, the brokerage Vietcap said in a report.
The coastline constraint
The harder constraint may be the coastline itself. An said salinity, wind loads and marine exposure increase construction and maintenance costs, and developers are facing greater scrutiny over land conversion, erosion and environmental impact.
The recent debate over Vinhomes’ Hai Van Bay shows how quickly coastal-development projects can become controversial.
The 512.2-hectare project at the foot of Hai Van Pass, with a planned investment of about 44 trillion dong (US$1.7 billion), was launched in April 2026 and positioned as a new tourism and urban anchor for Da Nang.
But public backlash came after images of construction works on the site – which once used to be a tranquil landscape at the foot of one of central Vietnam’s most recognisable mountain passes – circulated over social media.
This underscored the reality that while coastal land is commercially valuable, it is also environmentally sensitive, culturally visible and often regarded by the public as shared landscape.
Sheren of HAUS said Vietnam’s fast economic growth means the country needs more housing and better infrastructure, “but what it doesn’t need are mass, cookie-cutter developments that are low quality and low sustainability”.
“If you start ripping out your nature, you get what you get,” he added.
He also pointed out that fast-growing coastal markets face a common challenge – creating waterfront communities without eroding the natural assets that make them attractive.
Resilience should also be built in from the outset, he argued. At Coastal Quang Ngai, HAUS has planted 12 hectares of mangroves, designed waterways around tidal movement and buildings around coastal winds and flooding; it also plans to incorporate renewable energy, water reuse and passive cooling.
“Nature-based resilience is really powerful,” Sheren said. “You don’t want to get to the point where it’s too late.” THE BUSINESS TIMES
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