Termite control in Phu Nhuan — old tube houses, housing estates, shared walls

Under Resolution 1685/NQ-UBTVQH15 (Article 1, clauses 53 to 55), the former Phu Nhuan district became three wards on 1 July 2025, the day Ho Chi Minh City replaced districts with wards as its local administrative units. At the start of 2025, ward 3 had already been merged into ward 4 and ward 17 into ward 15; ward 15 was then split between two of the new wards. For an address in the old ward 15 or 17, give us the house number and street and we work out the rest.

Phu Nhuan is on a route we travel regularly: all three wards take bookings from 07:00 to 20:00 every day, and the survey time is settled when you contact us.

Duc Nhuan ward

Old wards 4, 5 and 9 (ward 4 already including ward 3): many lane townhouses, and apartment towers along Hong Ha and Hoang Minh Giam.

Cau Kieu ward

Old wards 1, 2 and 7 and part of ward 15, round Phan Dinh Phung and Phan Xich Long: closely packed townhouses, many of them homes and businesses at once.

Phu Nhuan ward

Old wards 8, 10, 11 and 13 and the rest of ward 15, along Nguyen Van Troi, Le Van Sy and Huynh Van Banh: street-front townhouses mixed with rows of houses deep in the lanes.

Phu Nhuan has been settled for a long time: the village of Phu Nhuan is recorded from about 1698, and by 2019 the former district had nearly 164,000 people on just 4.86 km² (Wikipedia). The houses stand close together, mostly multi-storey tube houses (narrow and deep) with shared walls, repaired or raised more than once. The Nhieu Loc – Thi Nghe canal runs through the south and brings moisture to the rows nearest its banks.

Particular to Phu Nhuan are its housing estates of the 1950s and 1960s. Pham Cong Luan, writing in Nguoi Do Thi (2023), records that the Kien Thiet estate on Le Van Sy was built in 1955 after the great fire in the Nancy area, and that the Nha Truoc Ba estate on Vo Tanh street, today's Hoang Van Thu, had two parallel rows of single-storey houses. Such terraces share foundations and walls, so termites can move from one house along the row, all the more when the houses were altered at different times.

The University of Florida's guide (UF/IFAS) to the Asian subterranean termite says the species depends on moisture, moves inside mud tubes made of soil and can form secondary nests in the hollows of a wall. In an old Phu Nhuan house its usual routes are the crack between the original building and an extension, water pipes that have been in the wall for years, and a low, damp, tiled back yard. Typical signs:

• Timber doors and old-style timber ventilation grilles on the ground floor: a crumbling frame foot, a surface pitted and marked with soil.
• A mezzanine floor or timber staircase added in a renovation: hollow when tapped, dust falling onto the step below.
• An altar or timber altar cabinet against a shared wall: a mud tube running up the back.
• The joint between the old house and the added part: a thin line of soil following the mortar.
• A storeroom or under-stair space holding papers and old belongings: damp cardboard boxes eaten through.

Checking the signs yourself

Our guide to termites in Saigon houses shows where to look and how treatment runs from survey to follow-up checks.

Once the survey is done, our technicians choose the treatment that fits: at the affected point, with bait, through the ground slab, or a mix. Your Up specialist shapes the preparation to the way each household lives:

Houses on an estate or in a terrace

The technicians look closely at the shared walls, the ground slab and the back yard. If the signs point to termites arriving from next door, we recommend talking to the neighbours, so that one house is not treated only for the termites to cross back.

Tube houses with added storeys

Checked from the ground floor to the roof terrace, with attention to the joints between old and new work. The staircase is covered, and wood dust and fallen soil are gathered on each floor.

Old villas with a yard

The garden, tree bases and flower beds against the walls come within the survey. Drilling and lifting boards are done only on your written consent.

Street-front businesses and new apartments

A shop can be booked outside its trading hours, between 07:00 and 20:00. For an apartment, the contractor-registration paperwork for building management is prepared ahead.

We do not quote termite control at a set figure, because every old house has its own history of repairs and its own degree of infestation. The survey is not charged. The all-inclusive quote, sent in writing, sets out the method, the areas, the re-entry time (the hours a treated area must be left clear), the return inspections and the warranty conditions, and nothing is added without your written consent. It turns on:

• The number of storeys, the floor area and how many times the house has been extended.
• Whether the termites are in one place or have passed through several floors or a shared wall.
• The method proposed after the survey and the number of return inspections.
• The timber furniture, flooring and stairs to be treated, or dismantled for access.
• The covering, the moving of altar pieces and the cleaning that fall to your Up specialist.
• The warranty period, which varies with the method and is written in the quote.

Few homes in Phu Nhuan have a building management office, so we pay particular attention to the neighbours and the shared passage. Apartment buildings here often ask for people and equipment to be registered on the way in. Please:

• Tell us where to park near the house; many lanes here take only a motorbike, and the team walks the equipment in from the entrance.
• Warn the house next door if a treatment point is in the wall between you.
• Clear part of the mezzanine and the space under the stairs; put food and crockery into closed cupboards.
• Have grandparents, children and pets rest on another floor or at a relative's home for the re-entry hours given in the plan.
• Leave treated positions and monitoring stations exactly as they are until you receive new instructions.

Return inspections are booked as the quote sets out; we remind you and add each result to your Up Report. Between inspections these habits help an old house:

• Seal the crack between the old house and the extension, and repair a leaking pipe in the wall early.
• Keep offcuts of wood, cardboard boxes and old belongings out from under the stairs and out of a damp back yard.
• Stand the altar cabinet and wardrobes clear of the wall, and check their backs with a torch at the start of each rainy season.
• If a house in your row or estate finds termites, tell us and we advise on an early inspection.
• To book, message 0968 726 135 on WhatsApp or Zalo with a few photos of the altar cabinet, staircase or door you suspect and your address; an old ward number is fine. We call back to agree a survey time, and before the day we send the name and photo of the person coming.
• On treatment day the technicians work from the top floor down, or as the plan shows. Your Up specialist, identity-verified and trained to the Up Standard, follows, clears the dust, wipes the stair treads and returns altar pieces, furniture and papers to where they were photographed.
• The Up Report is a message with photos of each floor, treated positions and monitoring stations marked, and the date we come back.
• A change or cancellation made at least 24 hours ahead is free; within 24 hours the fee is 30%. If we are more than 15 minutes late, the invoice for that visit is cut by 10%.