One Month in Vinhomes Smart City, Hanoi, Vietnam

My wife needed to come back to Hanoi last minute to handle some family stuff, and decided to rent a small apartment for us in Hanoi while we’re here.

If you’re looking for very short-term full-service apartments throughout Vietnam, you generally have a decent selection of places to stay. In Hanoi though, that doesn’t seem to be the case… well, at least short-notice anyhow. My wife thankfully was able to find us a small apartment in the Vinhomes Smart City complex.

What’s A Smart City Anyway?

Now generally when I think of a “Smart Home”, I imagine living spaces with all sorts of cutting-edge tech… perhaps things like voice-activated lighting and controls, an internet-connected kitchen, and other modern tech-enhanced stuff within the living space.

For the City part of the Smart City, I guess I’d expect a continuation of that outside, somehow. According to Wikipedia however:

No commonly accepted definition of “smart city” has emerged.

And it’s really just

[…] an urban area that uses digital technology to collect data and to operate/provide services.

So I guess my ideas were a bit far fetched.

So What is Vinhomes’ Smart City then?

Per the Vinhomes Smart City webpage:

This project has created a classy living space for its residents. Moreover, it has upgraded the city’s IQ to become the first smart city in Vietnam. Once you reside in Vinhomes Smart City, you will master the technology world with your presence.

Interesting, I didn’t even realize cities had IQ’s. But I’m certainly eager to master the tech world with my presence! 😂

Sounds like a bunch of fluff, so how does it actually stack up to this claim?

The Smart City Complex in Hanoi

So first off, Vinhomes Smart City is basically a whole bunch of high-rise apartment buildings with built-in shops, surrounding a central courtyard that’s filled with various sports areas, parks for children, and paths for walking - certainly a rare site in Vietnam and absolutely a big plus!

At the time of me writing this, parts of it are still under construction, with some unfinished/vacant commercial spots and lobby areas, but the one we’re in appears to be mostly complete.

I say the one we’re in, because there seems to be multiple complexes, each with their own central courtyard, and each with their own set of amenities, that appear to be part of this “Smart City” project, and with what appear to be completely new developments (possibly different phases) still being constructed. It’s actually much bigger and extends out way further than I realized when we first arrived.

In fact, there’s a Vincom Mega Mall which I believe is part of the Smart City complex, and there are surely sections I haven’t seen, and possibly won’t see during our stay here.

The Courtyards

The courtyard in our complex is quite nice & big, and contains a number of things to keep you and the kids busy on the weekends and when you’re not working.

Swimming

There’s a pretty big pool (which I can only catch part of from our balcony window), which includes a smaller children’s pool.

Sports

There’s also 3 badminton courts - or possibly 2 badminton and one volleyball court, 2 tennis courts, 3 basketball courts, and a couple of ping pong tables.

Parks & Exercise

As you make your way around the courtyard, you’ll find several (possibly 4 or 5 in our complex) children’s parks/play areas at various points, as well as an outdoor exercise area, like you’d typically see throughout Vietnam.

Weight Lifting

There’s apparently also a gym, although I’m currently waiting to be shown where exactly the gym is and what equipment it has. So it remains elusive to me as I write this. I’ll update this post once I’ve seen it.

Update: So there is no gym after all. Or rather there is a private gym in the area, but it’s not part of the Smart City complex, and therefor not included.

Shops & Restaurants

And then finally, you’ve got various convenience stores, some fruit and veg shops, a pharmacy, a number of restaurants, a pastry shop or two, a few “cat toc” places (hair salons), an IELTS center, some baby/toddler shops, and I’m sure a few other things I’ve forgotten, on the ground floor of the buildings - which is also very typical of apartment complexes in Vietnam.

As I noted above, not all of the commercial spaces in our complex are occupied yet, so they’re still working on filling them out.

Our Apartment

As it’s just my wife, our toddler, and I here this time, we only needed a 1-bed apartment. They do have 2-bed apartments as well, and presumably larger ones too, but I haven’t seen what those look like and so can’t comment on those.

Most of the apartments here are long-term rentals, or owned, but some are sometimes available for short-term rental as well.

The apartment itself seemed ok. Nothing special, but nothing terrible either - or so I initially thought. It’s got a small kitchen with a small space for a dining table, a decent living room, a small bedroom, and a small bathroom with the typical Asian-style water-gets-everywhere-when-you-shower type showers. It’s all very small, but it’s enough for us for the month we’re here.

In the above-right pic, you can see an extra small area between the bedroom and bathroom. I have absolutely no idea what you’d put in this space, as it’s neither very large, nor bright due to a lack of natural light in this particular spot. We tried moving the dining table first, and then couch there … but neither really worked out.

So it’s just sitting there … empty. And useless.

This, unfortunately, seems to be quite common with Vietnamese living spaces from my personal experiences here. Not well thought out, and usually pretty poorly constructed - especially by companies like Vinhomes. By contrast, the apartment complexes we’ve stayed at that were designed and built by foreign (Singaporean, Malaysian, etc.) companies have been much better in terms of functional design, and possibly also construction quality.

The owner of this apartment also apparently didn’t see the need to have the place cleaned before we arrived and after the last tenants left. So we had some used toothbrushes, a pretty dirty bathroom, and hair all over the floor when we arrived. Nice. 😒

The view from our balcony overlooks the pool and courts. It certainly ain’t no beach view, but we wouldn’t be in Hanoi for that anyway!

So I don’t really mind the view being the central courtyard as it at least gives you a view of some nature (trees and whatnot) compared to what you’d get in a typical Vietnamese apartment complex.

A not-so-nice surprise

One of the things I suppose you need to get somewhat accustomed to in hot countries like Vietnam, is the presence of bugs. And I’m not talking about the occasional fly or mosquito. I’m talking about the big, ugly ones that you’d rather not have crawling/flying all over your living space. Cockroaches.

And I realized on my 3rd or 4th night here, our apartment is crawling with them at night. I did see the roach poop under the sink in the kitchen on the first day, but didn’t initially realize it would be so bad. Sigh. And the Smart City complex is still quite new, so it’s pretty unnerving to see so many of them around.

For the most part, the only places I’ve stayed in Vietnam that didn’t have roaches were the hostels, hotels, and the more expensive apartment complex we stayed at in Nha Trang, and the Son Tra Ocean View apartments in Da Nang. But I guess that’s just part of living in Vietnam and something you need to accept if you’re going to stay here.

Final Thoughts

So far, I’m not super impressed with the Vinhomes Smart City complex. It does have a lot to offer residents, and it’s certainly not the worst we’ve stayed in here in Hanoi, but I think it could be so much better. And the roaches are a big turn-off for me, especially in such a new development.

There are currently also a number of glitches with the security systems that let you use your fingerprints to use the elevators, and access the pool and gym. You also need to download a Vinhomes app to confirm/authorize your access to some things, which is a bit of a pain. Especially that the app is only in Vietnamese.

That said, I think the incorporation of so many sports areas and parks for kids is a big plus, and I think it’s a great idea to have these in the complex - as Hanoi is desperately lacking spaces like these. I just wish they’d put a bit more thought into the design of the living spaces.

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That’s it for now, but I’ll update this post as we spend more time here, and if I find out more about the gym, or anything else that might be of interest to those considering staying here.