Leasing of land use rights is when a land user (referred to as the lessor) transfers his/her land use right to another subject (referred to as the lessee) for use within a certain period of time. The lessee must pay the rent and return the land to the lessor at the end of the lease term. 

LEASING OF LAND USE RIGHTS

Conditions for the rights to lease land use rights

According to Clause 1, Article 188 of the Land Law 2013, Land users may exercise the rights to lease land use rights when meeting the following conditions:

• Having the certificate;
• The land is dispute-free;
• The land use rights are not distrained to secure judgment enforcement;
• Within the land use term.

Noted: The State shall lease the land to economic organizations, overseas Vietnamese or foreign – invested enterprises to invest in construction and commercial operation of infrastructure of industrial parks, industrial clusters and export processing zones. The lessee  has the right to sublease land use rights to the land with completely constructed infrastructure in case they are permitted to invest in the construction and commercial operation of infrastructure in industrial parks, industrial clusters, export processing zones, hi-tech zones or economic zones. For the land area that is leased with annual rental payment, the lessee may sublease that land with annual rental payment. For the land area that is leased with full one-off rental payment for the entire lease period, the lessee may sublease that land with full one-off rental payment for the entire lease period or annual rental payment (according to Clause 2, Article 149; Clause 1, Article 175 of the Land Law 2013). 

The subject has the right to lease land use right

According to the current law, the subject with the right to lease land use rights include:

• Household or individual;
• Economic organizations;
• Foreign- invested enterprises;
• Overseas Vietnamese.

However, the lease of land use right is not applicable to all above subject but is limited as follows: 

For Household or individual: To lease land use rights to other organizations, households, individuals or overseas Vietnamese investing in Vietnam (according to point d, Clause 1, Article 179 of the Land Law 2013).

For Economic organizations, Foreign- invested enterprises, Overseas Vietnamese: To lease land use rights and property on land under their ownership in case of being allocated with land use levy by the State and to sublease land use rights and property on land under their ownership in case of being leased land with full one-off rental payment for the entire lease period by the State (according to point b, Clause 2, Article 174; point c, Clause 3, Article 183 of the Land Law 2013). 

Competent Authority

• For localities that have established a Land Registration Office, the authority belongs to the Land Registration Office – Department of Natural Resources and Environment.
• For localities that have not yet established a Land Registration Office, the authority belongs to the Department of Natural Resources and Environment or the district-level People’s Committee.

Order of and procedures

Order to carry out the lease of land use rights, land users need to know the provisions of the law on land according to Article 79 of Decree 43/2014/ND-CP dated May 15, 2014 and Article 7 of Circular 33/2017/TT-BTNMT dated September 29, 2017. Order of and procedure for leasing land use rights will include the following steps: 

Step 1. Prepare documents

According to Clause 2, Article 7 of Circular 33/2017/TT-BTNMT, Land use right lease documents include: 

• Application for registration of changes in land and property on land, made according to Form No. 09/DK issued together with Circular 33/2017/TT-BTNMT;
• Contracts on the lease, sub-lease of land use rights and ownership of property on land;
• Certificates of land use rights (original copy);
• Written approval of a competent state agency for economic organizations that receive transfer, capital contribution or lease of agricultural land use rights to implement investment projects;
• Documents of land users which agree to owners property on land to lease this property. (For the case of leasing property on land that the owner of the property is not a land user at the same time.)

Quantity of profile: 01 set

Step 2. Submit application: 02 ways

1. Households, individuals submit profiles directly at the People’s Committee of the commune, ward or township where the land is located.
2. Do not submit at the People’s Committee of the commune, ward or township where the land is located.

Localities that have established a one-stop department shall submit  profiles directly to the district-level one-stop department (district, town, provincial city) where the land is located.

Localities that have not yet established a one-stop department shall submit profiles directly to the branch of the district-level Land Registration Office or the district-level land use right registration office, if there is no branch of the Land Registration Office.

Noted: For exercising the rights of land users on part of a land parcel, before submitting profiles for exercise of rights of land users, land users shall request the Land Registration Office to measure and divide the land area on which land users need to exercise their rights.

Step 3.  Authority to process profiles

Step 4. Process the requests and return the results

After receiving profiles, the Land Registration Office is responsible for checking profiles and considering if it is eligible rights as prescribed, it shall carry out the following procedures: 

• Send information to the tax department to determine and notify collection of financial obligations as prescribed. 
• Confirm the contents of changes in the granted Certificate in accordance with regulations of the Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment.
• Edit and update changes in cadastral records and land databases; give the Certificate to the land user or send it to the People’s Committee of the commune, ward or township to discuss with the case of submitting in the commune, ward or township. 

Implementation time:

• No more than 03 working days from the date of receiving the valid profiles.
• No more than 13 days for communes in mountainous, islands, deep-lying and remote areas, areas with difficult socio-economic conditions, and areas with extremely difficult socio-economic conditions.