Vietnam rises to a new category on global real estate transparency index

Vietnam, 14 July 2020 – Progress in Vietnam’s largest market, Ho Chi Minh City, has seen it rise one place in the rankings to 56th. More noteworthy however is that steady advances over the last two surveys have helped push Vietnam into the ‘Semi-Transparent’ market for first time in JLL’s biennial Global Real Estate Transparency Index (GRETI) 2020.

Stephen Wyatt, Country Head of JLL Vietnam, comments on the achievement “It is no surprise that Vietnam has moved from ‘Non-transparent’ to ‘Semi-transparent” in our latest transparency index. Over the past 10 years, Vietnam has become a top destination for manufacturing in South East Asia and attracted significant Foreign Investment.  Vietnam will need to continue improving rising up the rankings if it wants to attract more Foreign Investment”

Emerging markets have once again shown the greatest advancement in the Index, with six Asia Pacific markets – Mainland China (32nd), Thailand (33rd), India (34th), Indonesia (40th), Philippines (44th) and Vietnam (56th) – among the top 10 biggest improvers globally. Progress in many of Vietnam main cities, Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City, has pushed the country into a higher tier: ‘Semi-Transparent’. Singapore (14th) sits near the cusp of the ‘Highly Transparent’ tier as it has risen one spot from number 15 in 2018. 

Download Report Global Real Estate Transparency Index 2020

The 2020 Index is launched at a time of massive economic and societal disruption where the need for transparent processes, accurate and timely data and high ethical standards are in closer focus. The backdrop of COVID-19 is also ensuring that transparency within Asia Pacific’s real estate legal and regulatory systems is more important than ever to global investors, as they look to deploy approximately $40 billion* in dry powder capital into the region.

According to global property consultant JLL, pressure exists from investors, businesses and consumers to further improve real estate transparency to compete with other asset classes and meet heightened expectations about the industry’s role in providing a sustainable and resilient built environment in the age of COVID-19. Furthermore, innovative new property technology (proptech) is changing how real estate data is gathered and analyzed and influencing industry transparency at a regulatory level.

In both Asia Pacific and outside of the region, JLL’s research concludes that sustainability commitments have become the biggest single driver of real estate transparency globally since 2018. An increased focus on corporate social responsibility and acknowledgement of the need to create sustainable buildings bring environment, social and governance (ESG) considerations into the mainstream. Additionally, green building certification systems and energy efficiency standards are widespread in the region’s most transparent markets and the most improved national real estate sectors.

Another key driver of transparency is the volume of real estate market data now available due to the growing adoption of Proptech platforms, digital tools and “big data” techniques. Although real estate markets have historically faced challenges when implementing new technology, the COVID-19 pandemic is leading to an acceleration in new types of non-standard and high-frequency data – especially relating to health, mobility and space usage – being collected and disseminated in near-real-time.

“As the adoption of proptech and sustainability commitments continue to garner steam, greater transparency gains will be driven by both an evolving regulatory landscape and the collective actions by national real estate industries. With the outbreak of COVID-19, it will become even more crucial for the real estate industry to work collaboratively with local governments to achieve greater transparency and meet the changing expectations of investors as their appetites shift in accordance to the investment outlook over the next 12 to 18 months,” says Chris Fossick, CEO, JLL Southeast Asia.

The country’s strong economic prospects have drawn significant interest from both occupiers and investors, and that has led to increased competition and service offering from property management companies. While investment into commercial real estate has inevitably paused during the pandemic, the overarching trend toward rising allocations to this asset class will continue. As investors look to allocate more capital into real estate in this region, transparency becomes even more important.

JLL and LaSalle have been tracking real estate transparency and championing higher standards since 1999.  This 11th edition of the Global Real Estate Transparency Index (GRETI) covers 99 countries and territories, and 163 city regions. This latest survey has been extended to quantify 210 separate elements of transparency, with additional coverage on sustainability and resilience, health and wellness, proptech and alternatives sectors.