Short-Term Apartment Rentals: A Legal Perspective

In recent years, the short-term apartment rental model — letting a unit by the night or by the week through platforms like Airbnb and Booking, or through rental groups on social media — has become widespread in District 7, especially in the towers near Phú Mỹ Hưng that draw foreign residents and business travellers. The returns look more attractive on paper than long-term leasing, but they come bundled with a contested legal grey zone that many owners only discover once they are already in trouble. This article draws together what I have observed while helping clients in District 7 since May 2023 — offered as a reference so you know which questions to ask, not as a substitute for formal legal advice from a lawyer.

1. What short-term rental means and why it is contested

When people say "short-term rental," they usually mean hosting guests by the day or week, with flexible bookings made through an online platform — a model closer to a hotel service than to a residential lease. This differs sharply from traditional long-term leasing, where a tenant signs a six-month to one-year contract, registers temporary residence, and lives there in a settled way.

That difference is the root of the controversy: a condominium is licensed to be "lived in," so when it is run as a by-the-night lodging operation, the line between "living" and "running a lodging business" blurs — and that is what determines whether you comply with the rules.

2. The legal framework: condominiums and their intended use

The legal point most often cited lies in the 2023 Housing Law (effective from 1 August 2024), which requires that condominium buildings be managed and used in line with their residential purpose. Many people once read this as an outright ban on every form of short-term rental — but the reality is more nuanced.

In Official Letter 6249/BXD-QLN dated 6 November 2024, the Ministry of Construction stated that the 2023 Housing Law does not prohibit an owner from leasing their apartment for residential use, including short-term rental through platforms like Airbnb. However, if the apartment is used to run a tourism-lodging business, that activity must additionally comply with tourism law and related regulations. In other words, the line that matters is not so much "short-term versus long-term" as "leasing for residential use" versus "running a lodging-service business."

This is therefore an area still open to interpretation and dependent on how it is enforced in each locality and each building — not a boundary that has been settled once and for all. To picture it more clearly, it helps to distinguish:

• Residential condominium apartment: licensed for a housing function. Leasing it for someone to live in is the owner's right, but turning it into a tourism-lodging business is a different matter that brings tourism-law obligations and the risk of being flagged by the authorities, depending on enforcement.
• Serviced apartment: a type of property invested in and licensed specifically for lodging rentals, with business registration and the corresponding fire-safety and security conditions met.

The two look identical to a renter, but from a legal standpoint they are entirely different. Short-term lodging inside a "residential" condominium is a grey zone; operating within a properly licensed serviced-apartment building is far clearer and far safer.

3. House rules and the role of the building management board

Even if you believe the law still leaves room for interpretation, there remains a far more concrete and immediate barrier: the building's house rules. Most of the condominiums I deal with in District 7 carry a rule that prohibits or restricts short-term lodging rentals, set out explicitly in the house rules adopted by the building's general assembly of residents.

The management board and the building operations team have many tools to enforce this: refusing lift access cards to transient guests, requiring identity registration for everyone entering and leaving, restricting shared amenities such as the pool and gym, even drawing up an incident report if they find a unit operating as a lodging facility. When residents complain about security, noise, or strangers coming and going, the pressure on the host only grows. This is the point many investors overlook: even if you find a way around the legal angle, you still have to coexist with a management board that holds real authority over the shared space.

4. Temporary residence registration and security obligations

One often-underestimated obligation is temporary residence declaration. Under the residence regulations, the owner or the person letting the property is responsible for notifying the local police of guests who come to stay. For foreign guests, the temporary residence declaration must be made within a short window after the guest checks in — a requirement that is checked fairly strictly in areas with many foreigners, such as Phú Mỹ Hưng.

With the short-term model, guests change every few days, making the declaration obligation heavy and easy to miss. Each lapse is another exposure to administrative penalties for failing to properly notify temporary residence. And should a guest engage in unlawful conduct during their stay, your failure to declare correctly will make the situation more complicated and push more legal risk onto you.

5. Business registration and tax obligations

If your rental activity is regular and commercial in character, you may well need to register a household business and meet the corresponding tax obligations. But here is an easy point to get wrong: how the tax is calculated depends on whether the activity is classified as property leasing or lodging service. Under Circular 40/2021/TT-BTC, lodging service — including short stays for tourists and transient guests — is not counted as property leasing, and the two categories carry different tax rates. So do not assume that short-term rental is taxed the same way as long-term leasing; it is the legal nature of the activity that determines the tax obligation and the revenue threshold that applies.

Beyond tax, a genuine lodging model must also meet fire-safety and security conditions designed for lodging establishments — one more reason why running Airbnb inside a "residential" condominium struggles to fully satisfy the procedural requirements.

6. The real-world risks hosts commonly face

From the cases I have observed in District 7, several risks recur and are worth anticipating for newcomers:

• Risk of administrative penalties: for example, failing to register temporary residence, running an unregistered business, or being found by the authorities to be using the apartment for the wrong purpose — the extent depending on local enforcement.
• A tightening management board: refusing access cards, restricting amenities, or putting the matter to a residents' assembly to ban it outright.
• Damage and loss of property: short-stay guests are less attached, so the risk of damaged furnishings and missing items is higher.
• Disputes with neighbours: noise, strangers coming and going, and effects on shared security easily lead to prolonged conflict.
• Unstable cash flow: when the building rules to ban it, the income can stop abruptly while the furniture investment has already been spent.

I calculated the short-term rental returns very carefully, but I forgot one variable: the day the management board met and voted to ban it. Six months after I furnished the unit, the building issued a new rule, and I had to switch to long-term leasing at a price far below what I had originally expected.

— An apartment owner in District 7 shares

The story above is not rare. The lesson is not "never do it," but to price these legal and operational risks correctly before you stake your money.

7. Safer options if you want to rent it out

If your goal is a steady stream of income from an apartment in District 7, there are several routes that are considerably less risky than short-term rental inside a residential condominium:

Long-term leasing: sign a six-month to one-year contract with a tenant who genuinely lives there. The return may be lower in theory, but in exchange you get stability, fewer headaches with the management board, low operating costs, and a clear legal standing. For most individual investors, this remains the most balanced choice.

Investing in a properly licensed serviced apartment: if you truly want to pursue the short-term lodging model, look for buildings licensed for that purpose from the outset, with business registration and full operating conditions in place. The entry cost is higher, but you are not living in a grey zone.

Consult before you commit: whichever route you choose, a single conversation with a real-estate lawyer or a tax accountant before investing usually saves you far more than it costs. Ask specifically about the building's classification, its house rules, and the tax and temporary-residence obligations that apply to your situation.

Renting an apartment short-term is not simply a profit equation on a spreadsheet. It is a trade-off between expected cash flow and a whole set of very real legal, house-rule, and operational constraints. Understanding those constraints from the start does not make you pessimistic — it helps you decide with a clear head, pick the model that fits your appetite for risk, and avoid costly surprises down the line.