Moving to Vietnam: A First-Steps Guide for Expats

Vietnam has changed faster than almost any country in the region. Ho Chi Minh City and Hanoi have modern business districts, an expanding metro, an international school sector and a large foreign professional community, alongside street food that remains one of the great arguments for living in Southeast Asia.

Costs are genuinely low, growth has been sustained, and the manufacturing and technology sectors have drawn substantial foreign investment.

The administrative side is more demanding than the lifestyle suggests, and the central requirement is the work permit.

The work permit is the gate

Foreigners working in Vietnam generally require a work permit, obtained by the employer before employment starts. The documentation is substantial: a criminal record check, a health examination, and evidence of qualifications and experience - and the foreign documents typically need consular legalisation rather than a simple apostille, which is a slower process to arrange.

Start that document collection well before you move, ideally while you are still in the country that issued the certificates, exactly as described in getting your documents apostilled and translated.

Some categories are exempt from the permit requirement, but exemption must be confirmed through the proper process rather than assumed.

With a work permit you can then obtain a temporary residence card, which allows longer-term stay without repeated visa renewals and is a substantial quality-of-life improvement over rolling short visas. Cards are also available on the basis of investment or family relationship to a Vietnamese national.

There are various visa categories for investment, business and family, and the rules on visa types and durations have been adjusted more than once, so verify current terms. The Vietnam visa section covers the picture, and the general architecture is in visas and residence permits explained.

A note on remote work: Vietnam does not have a dedicated digital nomad route in the way some neighbours do, and living there long-term on tourist or business visas without a permit is a grey area rather than a plan. If you are working remotely, understand the position you are actually in - working remotely for a foreign employer sets out why it matters.

Money and tax

Vietnam taxes residents on worldwide income with a progressive personal income tax that reaches a fairly high top rate, and residence is generally established by presence beyond a qualifying period or by having a habitual residence there. Non-residents are taxed at a flat rate on Vietnam-source income, so your status in a first partial year matters.

Employment income is typically withheld by the employer, and there are compulsory social, health and unemployment insurance contributions - with specific rules for foreign employees that have been phased in and are worth confirming.

Structure is in the Vietnam tax section, and the residence principle in tax residency explained. Given the top rate and the interaction with a home country, a cross-border accountant in your first year is money well spent.

Property, and what you can actually own

Land in Vietnam is held collectively with land use rights granted rather than owned outright, and foreigners cannot hold land.

Foreigners may own apartments in eligible developments, subject to quotas limiting the proportion of units in a building and the number of houses in a given administrative area that may be foreign-owned - and typically on a long, renewable term rather than in perpetuity.

That structure is workable and is used by many foreign residents, but it needs proper legal advice: check the development’s eligibility, whether the foreign quota has been reached, and what the term and renewal position actually is. As everywhere, use your own lawyer rather than the developer’s - see buying property as a foreigner.

Renting is straightforward and inexpensive, usually with a deposit and often several months paid in advance.

Healthcare

The realistic picture: public facilities are inexpensive, basic and crowded, and are not generally what foreign residents use. International clinics and private hospitals in Ho Chi Minh City and Hanoi are of reasonable standard with English-speaking staff, and cost far less than Western equivalents.

For serious or complex conditions, transfer to Singapore or Bangkok remains common, which makes medical evacuation cover an important part of any insurance policy rather than an optional extra. Check that your policy includes it and understand the limits.

Details in the Vietnam healthcare section, and the general framing in health insurance for new arrivals.

Cost of living, and the two cities

Vietnam remains genuinely cheap. Rent, food, transport, domestic help and services are all inexpensive, and eating well costs very little. Imported goods, cars and alcohol are heavily taxed.

Ho Chi Minh City is the commercial centre - bigger, hotter, faster, with the largest foreign business community, concentrated in districts such as District 1, District 2’s Thao Dien area and District 7. Hanoi is the capital, cooler in winter with a genuine seasonal change, more traditional in feel, with the political and diplomatic community. Da Nang and Hoi An on the central coast have become popular with remote workers and families for their beaches and lower cost.

International school fees are the main family expense.

Two daily-life realities. Motorbikes dominate the traffic in a way that has to be experienced, and crossing the road is a learned skill - road safety is a genuine concern and is worth taking seriously. And air quality in Hanoi in particular can be poor for extended periods, which matters if you have respiratory sensitivity.

Language and culture

Vietnamese is tonal with six tones in the northern standard, which is the main difficulty for learners, though it uses a Latin-based alphabet which removes the script barrier. English is common among younger people in the cities and in international business, and much less so in administration.

Vietnamese social culture is warm, family-centred and entrepreneurial, with a strong emphasis on relationships in business. Bureaucracy tends to be paper-heavy and relationship-dependent, and the approach in dealing with bureaucracy abroad serves well - patience, complete documentation and a good local intermediary.

Getting around

Vietnam is long and thin, and the practical consequence is that domestic flights do most of the heavy lifting between the north, the centre and the south - they are frequent and cheap, and Hanoi to Ho Chi Minh City by air is routine.

The Reunification Express railway runs the length of the country and is a genuinely enjoyable way to travel if you have the time, though it is slow compared with flying.

Within cities, the motorbike is the dominant mode of transport, and this is the single biggest daily adjustment. Ride-hailing apps cover both cars and motorbike taxis and are cheap and widely used, which is what most foreign residents rely on initially. If you intend to ride yourself, understand the licence position properly: driving on an inappropriate licence can invalidate your insurance entirely, which is a serious exposure in a country with high road casualty rates. Converting or obtaining a Vietnamese licence is the correct route, and the general trap is covered in exchanging your driving licence abroad.

Metro systems have been under construction in both major cities and have begun opening in stages, which is progressively changing commuting in the corridors they serve.

Regional travel is one of the quiet pleasures of living here: Bangkok, Singapore, Kuala Lumpur and Hong Kong are all short, inexpensive flights away.

What catches people out

The legalisation requirements for work permit documents, which take longer than expected. Assuming remote work needs no permission. Apartment quotas being full in a chosen development. Traffic and road safety. And Hanoi’s air quality in the worst months.

For regional comparisons, moving to Thailand has a far more developed long-stay visa landscape, moving to the Philippines offers English as a working language, and moving to Malaysia sits between the two on cost and administration.

Detail on permits, property rules and costs is in the Vietnam country guide and the cost of living section. For current work permit and residence card experiences, the general forum is where people compare notes.