An apartment building on Da Nang Street in Van My Ward of Ngo Quyen District comprises 1,288 apartments housing more than 4,200 people.
Built between 1975 and 1980, the building has been seriously downgraded. Every time there is a storm, local authorities must evacuate residents.
Hai Phong has 178 apartment buildings, hosting 7,000 households, that are in so poor conditions that they need to be demolished.
The city's Department of Planning and Investment earlier this month invited bidding into 10 new apartment blocks that are expected to accomodate nearly 4,500 households from the dilapidated buildings.
The walls of one building have grown mossy and peeled.
Of the 10 buildings, each rising five stories, some blocks have been classified as dangerous, which means residents must be moved out.
Along the handrail of a building, wooden bars are used temporarily to replace iron bars that have disappeared.
Inside an apartment.
Living on the first floor, Bui Thi Lai, 68, says she has to use plastic canvas to cover the ceiling to prevent mortar from falling down.
The wall of Lai's apartment is also peeling.
She said the deterioration has been going on for a decade now.
At another house on the first floor, Dao Thi Dinh, 79, uses a plastic basin to catch water seeping through the ceiling.
Dinh and her husband have lived in the apartment of 40 square meters since 1993.
"I really hope we can move to another place or that the authorities restore this building," she said.
