Process And Procedures For Issuance Of A Land Use Right Certificate in Vietnam

Table of Contents

A certificate of land use rights (or a certificate of land use rights, ownership of houses and other land-attached assets, also known as “red books”) is a legal document for the State to recognise the right to use and own of houses and other land-attached assets of the person who has land use rights, ownership of houses and other land-attached assets. Issuing certificates of land use rights, ownership of houses and other land-attached assets is an important issue because this certificate not only helps to prove the rights of the owners to the land and land-attached assets, but also acts as valuable evidence in case a land dispute (which is a very popular and complicated kind of dispute) is happened. This article will clarify the process and procedures for issuance of a land use right certificate in accordance with the prevailing laws of Vietnam.

Required documents for the process and procedures for issuance of a land use right certificate

Households and individuals that carry out the process and procedures for issuance of a land use right certificate shall prepare 01 set of application dossier[1], including (i) Application for registration and issuance of a Certificate, following to Template No. 04a/DK2; (ii) Documents evidencing completion of financial obligations (documents related to the exemption or reduction of financial obligations on land and land-attached assets (if any)).

In addition to the two above-mentioned documents, it is subject to the desire of the owner whether he/she wants to register the land use rights or ownership of land-attached assets or all of it, an application dossier to be prepared on a case-by-case basis, specifically:

In case of registration of land use rights, one of the documents specified in Article 100 of the Land Law 2013 and Article 18 of Decree 43/2014/ND-CP must be submitted.
In case of registration of ownership of land-attached assets, there must be documents proving the ownership of such property (the property to be registered is a house, normally).

In case of registration of ownership of a house or construction works, a diagram of such house or construction work is required (unless there is a relevant diagram showing the status of such house and construction works in the ownership documents of such house or construction works).

When carrying out the process and procedures for issuance of a land use right certificate, the applicant may choose to submit copies or originals of documents[2], specifically:

Submit copies of documents that have been notarised or authenticated in accordance with the law on notarisation and authentication.
Submit a copy of the document and present the original for the person receiving the dossier to check and verify on the copy.
Submit original documents.

Process and procedures for issuance of a certificate of land use right

Step 1. Submitting application dossier

The state agency to submit documents to carry out the process and procedures for issuance of a land use right certificate is specified in Article 60 of Decree 43/2014/ND-CP as follows:

Option 1: Households and individuals can submit the application dossier to the commune-level People’s Committee (commune, ward, town where the land is located).
Option 2: Households and individuals can submit the application dossier to the branch of the district-level land registration office, or the dossier-receiving agency as prescribed by the provincial People’s Committee (one-stop unit) in case they don’t want to submit the application dossier to the commune-level People’s Committee. In case where a land registration office has not been established, applicant can submit the application dossier to the district-level land use right registration office.

Step 2: Receipt of application

The application-receiving agency is responsible for recording all information in the book of application-receiving and returning the results and providing the receipt of documents submission to the applicant. In case of receiving incomplete or invalid dossiers, within a maximum of 03 days, the dossier-receiving and processing agencies must notify and guide the applicants to supplement and complete the application dossiers.

Step 3: Processing the documents

During this step, competent state agencies may perform tasks according to their obligations to register and issue certificates to the land users. For the land users, please remember that it is their obligations to perform the financial obligations (land use fee, registration fee, certificate issuance fee, etc.). Upon receiving the payment notice, the land users shall pay the required amount within the time limit as prescribed in the payment notice and keep the evidence for completion of financial obligation for checking when the Certificate is issued.

Step 4: Delivering the result

After the district-level People’s Committees decide to grant certificates to households and individuals, the land registration office will update the information in the cadastral book and deliver the certificates to the applicant who has submitted the evidence for completion of financial obligation or send the Certificates to the commune-level People’s Committee to deliver to the applicants in case the application is submitted at the commune-level People’s Committee. The applicant shall then receive the originals application dossier and the Certificate.

The time limit for carrying out the process and procedures for issuance of a land use right certificate is regulated by the provincial People’s Committee[3]. However, it must comply with the following requirements:

No more than 30 days from the date of receipt of a valid application; no more than 40 days for communes in mountainous, coastal, remote areas, areas with difficult socio-economic conditions, and areas with extremely difficult socio-economic conditions.
The period does not include weekend, holidays as prescribed by law; does not include the time to receive the application dossiers at the commune-level competent state agency, the time to fulfil the financial obligations of the land users; does not include the time to review and issue the decision on violation of land use regulations in accordance with the prevailing laws, the time to seek for relevant assessment.

Above is an overview of the process and procedures for issuance of a land use right certificate that Phuoc & Partners share with readers. If you have any difficulties related to the legal field, please contact us. Phuoc & Partners is a professional consulting firm established in Vietnam and currently has nearly 100 members working in three offices in Ho Chi Minh City, Hanoi and Danang. Phuoc & Partners is also rated as one of the leading consulting firms specializing in business law in Vietnam that has leading practice areas in the legal market such as Labour and Employment, Taxation, Merger and acquisition, Litigation. We are confident in providing customers with optimal and effective service.