Thesis (M. Hous. M.)--University of Hong Kong, 2001. / Includes bibliographical references.

Thesis (M.Hous.M.)--University of Hong Kong, 2001. / Includes bibliographical references. Also available in print.

Thesis (M.Sc.)(Town Planning)--University of Pretoria, 2005. / Includes summary. Includes bibliographical references. Available on the Internet via the World Wide Web.

Affordable rental housing is an important form of housing tenure in urban areas, providing opportunities and choice for households seeking housing. Since 2004, government has recognised this and has extended the choice of tenure options available to very low, low- and medium-income households, particularly in better-located parts of the urban environment (McCarthy, 2010). This has resulted in the development of government programmes to support the development and strengthening of the rental sector. This study is an attempt to examine the delivery of affordable rental housing in urban areas, with the focus on Johannesburg inner city, and to assess options currently provided by role players in this sector and the constraints that are faced in achieving successful delivery of this accommodation. The study looked at large private and public organisations involved in this market for a comparative analysis of challenges in the affordable rental housing market. Interviews were conducted with key people from the selected organisations in the Johannesburg inner city in order to draw from their experiences of the market. Constraints highlighted by the organisations are; the slow release of buildings for conversion and upgrading into units by the City of Johannesburg, high costs of utilities charged by the City of Johannesburg in the inner city and the monthly rentals defaulting by tenants. As a way forward, it is anticipated that the new Inner City Property Scheme will address the slow release of stock for conversion and upgrading into units. The study recommends that continuous research on affordable rental housing should be done in order to establish innovative ways of dealing with the challenges.

Thesis (M.Sc.)--University of Hong Kong, 2009. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 134-139).

As the principal subsidized home ownership housing scheme in Beijing, the Economical and Suitable Housing Scheme (ESHS) has gone through several different stages in the past three decades. Following the newly developed housing policy framework in 2007, ESHS was endowed with the objective of providing affordable home ownership to low-income urban residents. Despite the rich literature on ESHS in China, relatively little is known about the performance of estates of ESHS in Beijing developed after 2007 under the new regulations. Largely missing from the existing literature is an analytical account of the development of ESHS in Beijing and an in-depth evaluation and explanation of its performance in recent years. This study thus aims to examine and analyze the effectiveness of ESHS since 2007 with the intention of helping to improve the effectiveness of ESHS and to provide useful lessons to other subsidized housing schemes in Beijing. Following the lead of scholars who have studied subsidized housing schemes in other countries and areas, this study built up its own analytical framework appropriate to the Chinese context. To achieve the study goal, the evaluation of the performance of ESHS was conducted in terms of four indicators: housing affordability, housing accessibility, housing availability and housing quality. The investigation of the causes were conducted from the public policy perspective focusing on policy design and policy implementation. To enhance the data base, open-ended interviews with officials at different levels from different government departments and structured questionnaire surveys with residents in ESHS in Beijing had been conducted. This study reveals that the performance of ESHS after 2007 was barely acceptable. Specifically, the housing affordability and housing accessibility and housing quality of ESHS were less than satisfactory. Even though the housing availability of ESHS in quantity terms did not have significant problems, the housing availability in terms of location was highly undesirable. As for housing affordability, it is found that the ESHS was more affordable to urban residents than to suburban residents, the major reason being the higher income enjoyed by the former. Regarding housing accessibility, this study found that the approach to determine the eligibility criteria of ESHS failed to include all the households who could not afford to purchase market housing. In the housing quality domain, it is found that ESHS housing estates in Beijing failed to meet the residents’ daily needs, and suffered from poor housing construction quality and inconvenient locations. In addition to the evaluation of performance, this study also found that besides the strong commitments from the government, policy design commensurate with policy goal and effective policy implementation determines the performance of a subsidized housing scheme. In particular, the formulation of eligibility criteria and the pricing mechanism at the policy design stage, and the conflicting interests of the three levels of government at the implementation stage were most critical. This study further argues that the four dimensions of performance which were inter-connected to each other were all commonly hinged upon the use of land as the main source of subsidy. This study adds to the existing literature on contemporary China by evaluating and explaining the most recent performance of a dominant housing subsidy policy tool in China. By constructing and employing a comprehensive conceptual framework for the analysis, this study offers to the contemporary China literature a sophisticated yet revealing conceptual tool to unveil the intricacies of housing subsidies in the rapidly changing China. / published_or_final_version / Urban Planning and Design / Doctoral / Doctor of Philosophy

Thesis (M.U.P.)--University of Michigan, Dept. of Urban Planning. / Also issued in print.

Thesis (M.S.)--Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, 1991. / Vita. Abstract. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 72-74). Also available via the Internet.

Thesis (M.U.P.)--University of Michigan, Dept. of Urban Planning.

M.Tech. / South Africa is one of the countries in the world that has delivered the highest number of houses to the poor through various delivery mechanisms. This was done to fulfill her vision of adequate housing for all, as reflected in the National Housing Policy framework. Over the last fifteen years, the African National Congress [ANC] led government has vigorously ensured that essential services were made available to advance the lives of ordinary people. Since 1994 to date, about 2 700 000 houses have been delivered, providing more than 13 million people with secure homes. One of the housing strategies, as contained in the National Housing Policy of 1994, was to provide subsidy assistance to low income groups to enable them to become home owners and improve their quality of life. The Housing Subsidy Scheme, adopted as the channel of delivery, has to date helped reduce the housing backlog and is tending to reach the goal of eradicating informal settlement by 2014. This research work is an evaluation of the post-occupancy experience of housing subsidy beneficiaries. The study evaluated satisfaction levels of subsidy beneficiaries, what beneficiaries actual do with the subsidized houses after they have been allocated to them, to ascertain if the subsidized houses have improved the beneficiaries’ lives. It also evaluates if the progressive strategy of housing to South Africa citizens is being realised; as well as determining government commitment in maintaining these houses. The methodology used for the study was both qualitative and quantitative. The quantitative research was conducted in four already established housing subsidy locations in Johannesburg, Gauteng Province of South Africa. A structured questionnaire with dichotomous, multiple choice, scaled, matrixtype and open-ended questions was used to conduct interviews and obtain data during the survey. Findings from the study revealed that the progressive strategy of housing is successful in fulfilling its vision to supply adequate housing to all its citizens. However, beneficiaries are not satisfied with the subsidized houses, because of the units’ sizes. Also, defects occurred in the houses delivered. These defects include roof leakages, cracks in walls, lack of finishing internally and externally, and defects in roof trusses. The cause of these defects was a result of poor quality control mechanisms put in place by the Department of Housing. Lastly, it was also revealed that the government has no plans in place to prevent slum conditions in the subsidized housing areas, by means of a well structured maintenance system. Based on the findings from the study, it is recommended that the Department of Housing and administrator of subsidized housing units in Gauteng should conduct a complete and thorough needs analysis of the beneficiaries of a proposed housing subsidy development, it is also recommended that government should provide as wide a choice of housing and tenure options as is reasonably possible. This can be achieved through the rental housing option. It is further recommended that the Gauteng Department of Housing should set up an independent section to carry out monitoring of subsidized houses during construction and formulate an appropriate maintenance culture that will help in encouraging beneficiaries to maintaining the subsidized house. In addition, the Department of Housing should move beyond the progressive realization of the right to adequate housing as contained in the South Africa Constitution, to the use of the housing to improve the lives of the citizens and lastly, the Gauteng Department of Housing should conduct more post-occupancy evaluations of housing subsidy beneficiaries’ experiences. By conducting more POE, the Department of Housing will be well informed of the satisfaction levels of the occupants whether the house is up to standard, if the houses have improved the lives of occupants and what actually they are doing with the houses once they are allocated to them.