Prices fly at you fast. This sheet + listening drills = never overpaying "foreigner tax" by accident.
PHẦN I · 01
The irregular traps — five rules that bend the numbers
Five numbers don't sound the way their spelling suggests once they land after a "tens" word, and every one of them is a place learners get quietly overcharged or just plain misunderstood.
| Rule | Wrong | Right |
|---|---|---|
| 5 after a tens word: năm → lăm | mười năm | mười lăm (15), hai mươi lăm (25) |
| 1 after a tens word: một → mốt | hai mươi một | hai mươi mốt (21, 31, 41...) |
| 4 after tens often: bốn → tư | hai mươi bốn | hai mươi tư (24) — both heard |
| 10s: mười → mươi in 20-90 | hai mười | hai mươi (20), ba mươi (30) |
| 100s must say "linh" for 0-tens | một trăm năm | một trăm linh năm (105) |
Five rules, eight numbers. The drill only asks about the ones that bend — the rest of the number system you can already read straight off the page.
Số này đọc thế nào?
PHẦN II · 02
Big numbers — money is thousands, always
The word for "thousand" almost never gets said out loud in a price — Vietnamese speakers drop it the way English speakers drop "dollars" and just say the number.
| Word | Value | Street shorthand |
|---|---|---|
| nghìn (N) / ngàn (S) | 1,000 | "k" — 50k = năm mươi nghìn |
| chục | ten (chục nghìn = 10k unit) | "hai chục" = 20k in market talk |
| trăm | 100 (trăm nghìn = 100k context) | "ba trăm" usually = 300k |
| triệu | 1,000,000 | rent talk: "năm triệu rưỡi" = 5.5M |
| rưỡi | ...and a half | hai trăm rưỡi = 250k; ba triệu rưỡi = 3.5M |
Context rule: at a market, bare numbers mean thousands. "Ba lăm" = 35k. In rent/salary talk, bare numbers mean millions. Nobody says the zeros.
PHẦN III · 03
Price dialogue skeleton — the whole haggle in five moves
A market negotiation is short and it follows the same shape almost every time — knowing the shape in advance means you're never caught guessing what comes next.
Hỏi giá — ask the price
Bao nhiêu (tiền)? — "how much?" Your opening move, every time.
Nghe giá đầu — hear the opening number
Ba mươi (nghìn) — "30k." Whatever number comes back first is an opening offer, not a fixed price.
Trả giá — push back, smiling
Đắt quá! Bớt đi! — "too expensive, lower it!" Said with a smile, this is expected, not rude.
Chốt giá — land on a number
Thôi, hai lăm nhé — "fine, 25 then." Lấy đi! — "take it!" is how the seller seals it.
Trả tiền — pay it
Có tiền lẻ không? — "got small change?" Chuyển khoản được không? — "can I bank-transfer?" (answer: quét mã — scan the QR).
PHẦN IV · 04
Time & counting odds
Hours use mấy, not bao nhiêu: Mấy giờ rồi? (what time is it?) → Ba giờ rưỡi (3:30) — and the same split carries through generally, mấy for a number you expect to be small, bao nhiêu for one you don't: Mấy người? versus Bao nhiêu tiền?
Ordinals ride a thứ + number pattern, and the days of the week are built from the exact same ladder — thứ hai (2nd, also Monday), thứ nhất (1st, irregular), thứ tư (4th, also Wednesday), all the way to chủ nhật (Sunday, the one day that breaks the pattern).
PHẦN V · 05
Ear training
Numbers are the fastest, most tone-dense speech you'll hear. Drill: record market/Grab audio → drop into 06-audio-inbox/ → replay price sentences at 0.7×; transcript shows what was actually said.
PHẦN VI · 06
If you remember nothing else
The room tells you the unit
The same bare number means thousands at a market and millions in rent talk — nobody ever says "nghìn" or "triệu" out loud.
Five numbers bend when they follow "tens"
năm→lăm, một→mốt, bốn→tư, mười→mươi, and 100s need "linh" before a 0-9 tail — memorize these five, not the whole number system.
Haggling is a smiling ritual, not rudeness
Đắt quá! Bớt đi! is the expected opening move, not a complaint — skipping it can look stranger than doing it.
mấy asks small, bao nhiêu asks open
Mấy giờ? and Mấy người? expect a small answer; Bao nhiêu tiền? expects anything at all.