Located near Giang Vo Lake, one of Hanoi’s prime locations, the Golden Lake apartment project are priced at $6,500 per sqm. This hotel-apartment complex is said to have 5,000 sqm of gilded ceramic on the outside, in addition to 24k gilded furniture and a gilded pool.
Works on the project site was kicked off in 2009, but its original developer Mefrimex Technology Investment and Development Company ran out of money and recently sold it to Hoa Binh Ltd, which is known for its gold-plated apartment projects in Hanoi and Da Nang.
One of gold-plated apartment projects in Hanoi.
One of Hoa Binh Ltd’s project is the Hoa Binh Green City on Minh Khai Street, Hai Ba Trung District, Hanoi. According to the developer, its stairways, balconies and bathroom accessories are all gold-plated. However, in 2018, its occupants held several protests with banners in front of the building for not getting title documents after three years.
The D’Palais de Louis in the district of Cau Giay is another apartment with gilded furniture that has made headlines in recent years. The 27-story tower has been built since 2009.At that time, units at the project was priced at VND145 million ($6,219) per sqm. It means an apartment cost up to $1.3 million and penthouses cost around $4.29 million on average.
In 2011, sixty customers put down deposits for these gold-plated units, but developer Tan Hoang Minh Group failed to meet the construction deadline of 2015 and refunded the buyers.
The developer said it could not acquire the title to the land. Tan Hoang Minh again started selling two years ago, but was unable to attract buyers. The building is now 90 percent complete, but the developer’s sales progress remains unclear.
Most of the gilded projects in Hanoi are located in prime locations, but industry insiders said they fail to lure home buyers.
Apartment buyers are now looking for modern buildings, not gold-plated apartments, which look old-fashioned, said Chairman of a large real estate developer in Hanoi, who prefers to preserve his anonymity. He added promoting a project as gilded is a failed marketing strategy with high costs to boot.
"Vietnamese customers are practical. They care more about the reliability of the investor and post-sales services quality,” he pointed out.
