A property agency on Phu Quoc built a planning-lookup app: 46 ratings, behind it 21k plots for sale

Đất Vàng Quy Hoạch is a Vietnamese-language iPhone app that does one thing: it overlays Phu Quoc's 2030-year land-use plan on satellite maps. Enter a sheet number and plot number and it tells you what the plot is zoned as. It has been on the store for just over two weeks and has 46 ratings, so it's small. What's worth a look is who built it and why now. The publisher is a land agency on the island, and the app is free because it's there to bring in clients. This piece covers how it got started and whether others can copy the playbook.

A group post

On Oct 21, 2026, at 10:52 in the morning, an account called "Quốc Vương Phú Quốc" posted in "Thành Phố Phú Quốc News", a big local Facebook group for Phu Quoc Island:

Đã có đủ app check quy hoạch Phú Quốc trên IOS và Android……Hiện tại xài miễn phí cho tất cả người dùng, tk full tính năng cho khách hàng và đối tác Đất Vàng Phú Quốc

Roughly: planning lookup now works on iOS and Android, free for everyone; clients and partners of Đất Vàng Phú Quốc get all features unlocked on their accounts. The post image is a map with colored zoning blocks. The post got 104 reactions, 8 comments and 2 shares (Facebook, 11-06). The same account also posted a short video titled "Look up Phu Quoc land planning in 10 seconds, for 0 VND."

The app launched the same day. The developer on the App Store is GOLDEN LAND PHU QUOC LIMITED COMPANY, which has only this one app. Đất Vàng Phú Quốc ("Phu Quoc Golden Land") is a land agency on the island. Its site datvangphuquoc.vn claims "21,480+ plots for sale on consignment," "90+ clients per month," "29 partner agents," and that it can push listings to "12,000+ investors." Its channels are its community on Zalo, Facebook and YouTube.

What it is

Opening the app shows satellite and street maps with no login required. You can overlay planning layers and adjust their transparency to see both the zoning and the satellite imagery beneath. Looking up a plot by sheet number, plot number and commune requires login: the app outlines the plot on the map and shows a table of which zoning uses it falls into, the area of each in square meters, and the percentage. Accounts with permission can tap plots on the map directly.

Version 1.3.3 from Oct 24 added "old-to-new map sheet number conversion." That's a need specific to Phu Quoc right now, as explained below.

The store description repeats in capitals that this is not a government app. The data was digitized from the government's publicly available "Phu Quoc 2030-Year Land Use Plan," and the original maps can be downloaded from the special zone's government website. In other words, anyone can get the data. The app's value is turning PDFs and images into a plot-level lookup tool.

Free accounts can do basic queries, but some map layers are locked and there's a daily query limit. The Premium price isn't public. Judging from the post, Premium looks more like a perk for clients and people who leave good reviews than a product meant to make money.

How big it really is

(App Store Vietnam storefront, daily figures)

Average score 4.7, charted in just one store, Vietnam. In Nov 2, the same account posted that the app had "vừa cán mốc 1200+ người sử dụng" (just passed 1,200 users). That's the company's own claim and we can't verify it. Beyond iOS, the post says there's an Android version too, but we couldn't find its package on Google Play, so the install count is unknown.

The Vietnam Reference category has a low bar. A few ratings a day can reach the top 100. Charting here doesn't show how big the app is, only that it's in a category with few players.

Where users come from

1. The agency's own community, main channel, confirmed. On launch day it was posted first in a large local group, and another Phu Quoc property group reshared the same video. The company also runs TikTok @datvangphuquoc (6,733 followers, 143 videos, 34k total likes, 11-06), a Facebook page and a YouTube channel. These accounts already exist to sell land, so their followers are people already looking at land on Phu Quoc.

2. Reviews traded for Premium, confirmed. The Nov 2 post said, in part:

Mọi người vào review app nhé. Chiều nay tầm 18h hệ thống tự quét để upgrade tự động hạng premium cho mọi người đang dùng app đã review.

Roughly: go leave a review on the app. At about 6 this evening, the system will scan and automatically upgrade everyone who reviewed to Premium. The rating curve matches: 11-03 gained only 1, then 11-04 gained 15 in one day, the biggest day of the whole observed period. Looking back, 8 written reviews on the App Store cluster on Nov 1, mostly one-liners like "useful," "accurate," "Ngon" (good). That suggests a mobilization round happened before the post. After the push, the ranking fell back: 11-03, then #65,11-06, then #156.

When replying to reviews, the developer also pushed again: "We hope you'll keep supporting us and introduce the app to your friends and colleagues in real estate."

3. Agents bringing clients, inferred. The site says there are 29 partner agents, and the app gives clients and partners full-feature accounts. Agents using it to look up plots on the spot for clients is the most natural way it spreads.

4. Search, already in progress, effect not verified. The official site is a content site: planning zones, land prices by street and commune, a Phu Quoc encyclopedia, an APEC 2027 story map, and 5 calculators (land use fees, transfer taxes, loans, old/new sheet conversion, administrative forms). Whatever you search about buying land on Phu Quoc, it wants you to land on its site.

No paid ads found, no media coverage, and no discussion on X.

Why now

Three things converged.

• The 2025 administrative merger. Kien Giang province merged into An Giang, and Phu Quoc went from a city to a "special zone," with its wards and communes renumbered. Buyers' red books (land certificates) carry the old sheet numbers, while the new planning maps use new ones, and they don't match. "Old-new sheet conversion" became something everyone on the island needs, which is why version 1.3.3 added it.
• APEC 2027 is held on Phu Quoc. Since the second half of 2025, Vietnamese media and property groups have talked up "riding the APEC wave," and the island has been speculating on land. Buyers' biggest worry is zoning: could this plot be expropriated, or converted to residential use? Checking planning is a must before any deal.
• National planning was just adjusted. Decision 1177/QĐ-TTg of Jun 30 2026 adjusted the national land-use plan for 2021–2030, and local plans are being updated to follow, so data in older tools is out of date.

Who it's competing with

Planning lookup is a mature and crowded category in Vietnam. National platforms have had it for years, and there's a matrix of one app per province. Dedicated Phu Quoc tools are a local agency thing, and local agencies copy each other.

(Android install figures from Google Play; iOS figures from the App Store, 11-06)

Feature-wise, nothing here is unique to it. What sets it apart is three things: it covers only one island, it goes down to the plot level, and its data is kept current through the merger. On iOS, dedicated Phu Quoc apps are nearly nonexistent. Behind it stand an agency, its community, its agents, and over 20,000 plots on consignment.

Where the money comes from

The app itself charges nothing. The money comes from outside: consignment fees from sellers, commissions on matched deals, and recruiting partner agents. People who look up planning are people looking at land, and logging in requires an email or a Google or Apple account, so each account is a lead. How many consignments or deals the company gets from the app isn't visible from outside.

If it were you

Bottom line: C. The playbook is clean, but this app itself isn't worth copying. Its cold start rests on one agency's existing community and agent network, and its revenue rests on that agency closing deals. An indie developer has neither. The ceiling for a single island is low, local agencies already have the same tool, and national platforms carry Phu Quoc data too.

Who it suits: People already in property or land brokerage in a particular region, or who know local agencies well enough to partner with them. Or someone who knows GIS and is willing to build white-label tools for agencies for a service fee.

Who it doesn't suit: Anyone hoping to earn from subscriptions on the app alone (Vietnamese land buyers prefer to ask agents, and paid platforms like Thongtin.land already hold that spot). Anyone trying to build a national platform to compete with Guland or Thongtin.land on data. Anyone without local contacts planning to build an audience from scratch.

How to do it: Pick a place where land is being speculated on: a major event, a recent administrative redraw, or freshly updated planning. Digitize the public government planning maps, build a plot-level lookup that shows zoning shares, and add local calculators (land use fees, transfer tax, old/new sheet conversion). Keep the tool free and require login for plot lookups, since login is the lead. One app per region, with the place name and "quy hoạch" in the title, to win store search. The province-by-province apps on Android already show this can reach hundreds of thousands of installs. The most realistic route is to partner with a local agency that has a community: you provide the tool, they provide traffic and deals, and you split revenue by lead or by closed deal.

How to get users: Do what it did: launch in local property groups on Facebook and Zalo, make short videos like "look up planning in 10 seconds for 0 VND," and give agents and clients full-feature accounts so they can use it with buyers on the spot. Pushing ratings through "leave a review, get Premium" does work, but it violates Apple's rules: reviews can be removed and the app can be penalized. Weigh that yourself.

On timing: This Phu Quoc wave rides APEC 2027, and interest will likely fade after the summit. The sheet-number mismatch is also a transitional problem that will disappear in a year or two. For another region, you'd need to find what's happening there right now.

What would mean I got it wrong: ① By early 2027, its ratings still sit under 100 and it hasn't spread past Phu Quoc, which would mean "one agent, one tool" tops out at this size. ② It starts a second region, or agents in other cities adopt its system, which would mean the tool itself sells and deserves an upgrade. ③ Apple wipes its reviews or pulls the app, which would mean trading Premium for good reviews can't be copied. ④ National platforms (Guland, Thongtin.land) add old-to-new map-sheet conversion and its new installs stop, which would mean its edge was just a time lag.

Data and sources

• App Store: Đất Vàng Quy Hoạch (id6823221259) Vietnam store page, ratings, charts, reviews, 10-28 to 11-06.
• Facebook: launch post in the "Thành Phố Phú Quốc News" group, 10-21; "Quốc Vương Phú Quốc" page post 11-02 with "1200+ users, write a review to upgrade to Premium" and a "10-second planning lookup" video.
• Website: datvangphuquoc.vn homepage and old-to-new map-sheet conversion page.
• TikTok: @datvangphuquoc profile, 11-06.
• Competitors: Google Play and App Store pages (11-06); quyhoach.phuquochome.vn; guland.vn Phu Quoc page.
• Background: vietnamnet coverage of APEC 2027 and Phu Quoc real estate; Vietnam's Ministry of Agriculture and Environment release on 1177/QĐ-TTg; Phu Quoc special zone government site's planning map download page.
• The 1,200 user count is self-reported by the company; finding no ads doesn't mean none were run.