Resort apartments for rent in Nha Trang and Phu Quoc: is the cash flow steady?

Basis: tourism figures from the Khanh Hoa Department of Culture, Sports and Tourism and the An Giang Department of Tourism (via press); 2017 Law on Tourism; 2020 Law on Residence; Personal Income Tax Law 109/2025/QH15; Decree 141/2026/ND-CP; research by STR, Savills, Avison Young · Updated 24 October 2026.

When you buy an apartment in Nha Trang or Phu Quoc to rent out, the real cash flow depends on five factors: visitor numbers and new room supply, the gap between high and low season, licensing and tax for short-stay lodging, operating costs (usually the biggest item) and the terms of the developer / operator. Rising visitor numbers are a necessary condition; the deciding figure is the money left after a full year of costs, including the quiet months.

Visitors: rising strongly, but room supply is rising too

Locality	2025	First 9 months of 2026
Khanh Hoa	about 16.4 million visits, of which 5.5 million international (estimate)	over 20.4 million visits (up 45.66%), international over 7.1 million (up 69.05%)
Phu Quoc special zone	about 8.1 million visits, about 1.8 million international (estimate)	over 8.57 million visits, international over 1.92 million (up 60.2%)

Three things to read alongside these figures:

• The province boundaries have changed. Khanh Hoa now includes the former Ninh Thuan province, and An Giang includes the former Kien Giang (from 1 July 2025), so the year-on-year increase for the province is not entirely an increase in Nha Trang. Phu Quoc's figures (a special zone) are not affected by the provincial merger.
• Room supply is rising too. In 2025, Khanh Hoa had about 70,500 lodging rooms, over 40% of them 4–5 star; the province targets about 100,000 rooms by 2030. In Phu Quoc, Savills recorded more than 10,000 hotel rooms under development, due to be completed before the end of 2027 (Znews, 1 April 2026). When visitors grow but new rooms grow faster, room rates are pushed down.
• An event year is not an ordinary year. Savills Hotels judges that sustaining occupancy after APEC 2027 in Phu Quoc is a "major challenge". Do not take a major-event year's revenue as the average.

High and low season: the part most easily overlooked

The two markets have offset seasons. Phu Quoc is busy in the dry season (roughly November to April); the rainy season, roughly May to October, is quieter with lower room rates. Nha Trang's rainy season runs roughly September to December, with November usually the wettest; some sea activities such as diving are suspended.

Occupancy also swings sharply between years. According to STR data (People's Court Magazine, 3 April 2026), in January–February 2026 Phu Quoc hotel occupancy exceeded 90%, while in the same period of 2024 it was only about 50%; the Nha Trang – Cam Ranh cluster rose from under 50% to over 60%. The first two months are Phu Quoc's peak season, so do not use this figure for the whole year.

The right way to calculate: split the year into two seasons, estimate occupancy for each season separately (from the real booking calendar of a unit in the same building), then add them up. A unit that is 90% full during the three best months can still average only about 50% over the whole year.

Short-stay rental: licences, residence notification, tax

Renting to tourists by the night is running a lodging service business, not an ordinary home rental. Under the economic sector system (Decision 36/2025/QD-TTg), short-stay rooms fall in sector group 55 (lodging services), separate from the housing rental group. This brings three tasks:

• Business conditions (2017 Law on Tourism, Article 49): a business registration; meeting conditions on security and order, fire prevention, environmental protection, food safety (if food and drink are served); and meeting minimum conditions on facilities and services. A "tourist apartment" is a type of tourist lodging establishment under Article 48. Listing a unit on a booking app without a business registration does not meet the conditions.
• Residence notification: a lodging establishment must notify the police of guests' stays (2020 Law on Residence, Article 30); foreign guests are registered for temporary residence under the Law on Entry, Exit, Transit and Residence of Foreigners in Vietnam. Professional operators usually do this on your behalf — ask clearly in the contract who is responsible.
• Tax: the 5% personal income tax rate applies to individuals renting out real estate except lodging business activity (Personal Income Tax Law 109/2025/QH15, Article 7). The threshold of 1 billion VND/year below which no value-added tax or personal income tax is payable under Decree 141/2026/ND-CP applies to real estate rental. Which rate applies to short-stay lodging, and whether the 1 billion VND threshold is counted together with long-term rental income — ask the tax authority where the unit is before calculating cash flow.

In addition, ask the building management whether the house rules allow nightly rental, and whether the product is a tourist apartment (with a use term, for example 50 years) or a residential apartment / a home on long-term residential land — the two differ in ownership term and rental conditions.

Reference example: 8.2% revenue becomes about 2.8% net

Assumptions (not figures for a specific project): a 2 billion VND apartment, furniture included, 40 m²; average room rate 900,000 VND/night; high season 182 nights at 65% occupancy; low season 183 nights at 35% occupancy; booking app fee 15% of revenue; operator fee (cleaning, laundry, guest greeting, residence notification) 25% of revenue; building management fee 29,000 VND/m²/month; tax not counted (see the section above).

Item	Amount per year
Occupied nights (118 + 64)	182 nights (about 50%)
Room revenue (182 × 900,000 VND)	about 164 million VND
Booking app fee (15%)	− 25 million VND
Operator fee (25%)	− 41 million VND
Building management fee (40 m²)	− 14 million VND
Electricity, water, internet, consumables (1.5 million VND/month)	− 18 million VND
Maintenance, furniture replacement	− 10 million VND
Net income before tax	about 56 million VND (about 4.7 million VND/month on average)
Revenue ÷ unit price (164 ÷ 2,000)	about 8.2%
Net yield on unit price (56 ÷ 2,000)	about 2.8%

Bad scenario: if the low season reaches only 20% occupancy (37 nights instead of 64), revenue falls to about 140 million VND and net income to about 42 million VND, or about 2.1%. Revenue falls 15% but net income falls 25%, because management fees, utilities and maintenance must still be paid when rooms are empty. Cash flow is also uneven: most of the money arrives in the high season, and many rainy-season months do not cover costs.

Compared with long-term rental in Ho Chi Minh City, same calculation

Using the same formula (net income in the year ÷ unit price), the example in the article on gross and net rental yield: a 4 billion VND apartment in Ho Chi Minh City rented at 11 million VND/month, vacant 1 month a year, gives about 2.25% net. Avison Young's Q3/2026 report (reported by Vietnam+ on 13 October 2026) records Ho Chi Minh City residential rental yields of about 2–3% a year.

	Short-stay resort (example)	Long-term, Ho Chi Minh City (example)
Revenue ÷ unit price	about 8.2%	3.3%
Net yield on unit price	about 2.8% (bad scenario about 2.1%)	about 2.25%
Costs as share of revenue	about 66%	about 32%
Monthly cash flow	rises and falls with the seasons	steady, per the contract
Effort and licences	lodging business registration, notifying each guest stay	lease, declaring revenue once a year

The net yields of the two forms are much closer than the advertised revenue figures. The big difference lies in stability: long-term rental pays steadily each month, while resort rental depends on the season, flights, new room supply and the quality of the operator.

Operating costs and vacancy risk

• Operating fee: the operator may take a percentage of revenue, share profit at a set ratio, or charge a fixed fee. Read carefully which costs are deducted before the split (app fees, laundry, marketing, maintenance fund).
• Costs keep running when rooms are empty: building management fee, internet, insurance, furniture depreciation. The smaller the unit, the higher the share of fixed costs in revenue.
• Price competition: where several tourist-apartment buildings are handed over at the same time, low-season room rates are pushed down.
• Dependence on flight routes and guest markets: some major international markets arrive by direct flights; when a route cuts frequencies, visitor numbers fall with it. Savills also notes that geopolitical tension has caused short-term disruption to travel demand.
• Late handover: a project under construction earns no rent; calculate cash flow from the expected handover date plus a few months for finishing and permits.
• Borrowing: the monthly repayment does not change with the season — see safe bank leverage.

Resort projects HPR is distributing

• Alora Nha Trang — tourist apartments at Bai Tien, 50-year ownership; according to the project page, owners rent out on their own, and lyf by The Ascott only operates the hotel block on floors 4–7 and does not accept entrustment to rent out individual units.
• Libera Nha Trang — the Bai Tien coastal urban complex.
• Meyhomes Capital Phu Quoc — south of the island, near Bai Truong; the developer states the project is on urban residential land with long-term ownership.

See the full list at tourist and beach resort apartments. Before calculating cash flow for a specific unit, take room rates and occupancy from the real booking calendar of a unit in the same building or area, not from the figures in sales materials.

This article is for reference only and does not replace legal, financial or tax advice for a specific case. No profit is guaranteed.

1. Is the product a tourist apartment or a residential apartment? Until what year is the use term, and is there already a certificate or a document confirming eligibility for sale (the 5 groups of documents to check)?
2. Do the building's house rules allow owners to rent out by the night on their own? Is it mandatory to join the developer's rental programme?
3. Who operates, at what fee, calculated on revenue or on profit? Which items are deducted before the split?
4. Are there occupancy and average room-rate figures for each month for a building / project already operating with the same developer — including the rainy-season months?
5. How many nights a year may the owner stay, must they book in advance, and does it overlap the high season?
6. Who holds the lodging business registration, makes the residence notification to the police, and declares and pays tax on the owner's share of revenue?
7. What is the building management fee per m² per month, and is it charged when the unit is empty? What percentage goes into the furniture replacement fund?
8. If there is a "rental commitment" or "minimum revenue share": who commits, for how many years, is there a guarantee, and what happens at expiry? Is the committed level already built into the sale price?
9. Expected handover date, penalty for late handover, bank guarantee (guarantee for homes formed in the future)?
10. If you want to leave the rental programme or resell the unit, what are the conditions, notice period and fees?

• Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism (citing the Khanh Hoa Department of Culture, Sports and Tourism, VTV) — Khánh Hòa đón 16,4 triệu lượt khách du lịch trong năm 2025, 25 December 2025.
• The World & Vietnam Report (citing the Khanh Hoa Department of Culture, Sports and Tourism) — Khách quốc tế đến Khánh Hòa đạt hơn 7,1 triệu lượt (first 9 months of 2026; target of 100,000 rooms in 2030), 12 October 2026.
• An Giang Newspaper — Du lịch Phú Quốc nhộn nhịp cuối năm 2025 (estimated 8.1 million visitors, 1.8 million international in 2025), 13 December 2025.
• Mekong ASEAN — An Giang thu gần 58.000 tỷ đồng từ du lịch trong 9 tháng đầu năm (Phu Quoc, 9 months of 2026), 16 September 2026.
• People's Court Magazine (citing STR) — Phú Quốc tăng tốc đầu năm, vượt Bali và Phuket trong cuộc đua công suất phòng, 3 April 2026.
• Znews (citing Savills Hotels) — Phú Quốc có thêm 10.000 phòng khách sạn đến 2027, 1 April 2026.
• Markettimes (citing the Ministry of Finance's reply) — Vừa cho thuê nhà, vừa kinh doanh lưu trú ngắn ngày: tổng doanh thu 1 tỷ đồng/năm tính chung hay riêng (Decision 36/2025/QD-TTg, Personal Income Tax Law 109/2025/QH15 Article 7), 11 September 2026.
• Vietnam Financial Times — Doanh thu cho thuê bất động sản dưới 1 tỷ đồng/năm, cá nhân không phải nộp thuế (Decree 141/2026/ND-CP), 12 June 2026.
• Law on Tourism No. 09/2017/QH14 (Articles 48, 49); Law on Residence No. 68/2020/QH14 (Article 30).
• Vietnam+ (VNA, citing Avison Young) — Ho Chi Minh City's housing market sees price stabilisation, sharper buyer segmentation, 13 October 2026.
• Tourist seasons: Nha Trang rainy-season guide, Phu Quoc travel in the rainy season (tourism company pages — used only for the season frame).