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The primary purpose of this paper is to test an appropriate methodology for quantifying a return to residential property homeowners who were committed to make improvements to their homes prior to placing on the market for sale.

This is a pilot study where empirical data were collected via two survey instruments from nine homeowners within the Horowhenua/Manawatu region of New Zealand. Market values of the properties before and after home improvement were assessed using a variety of market value measures including a valuation by a registered valuer, property owner's assessment and sale price.

The findings reveal that both the registered valuations and the property owner's assessment of expected sale price was within the range ±8 per cent of the final sale price. Seven of the nine houses included in this pilot study showed a positive return on time and money invested in minor home improvements.

Limitations relate to the dated data, small sample size and geographical spread of the sample. The time and cost required to gather home improvement activity data is another limitation.

Potential exists for the model developed in this paper to be replicated internationally. This paper supports the view that homeowners who are actively involved in the real estate market have an accurate assessment of the value of their own homes. Improvements increase the quality and condition of existing residential housing stocks. Minor improvements are often overlooked due to the cost of gathering data. This paper encourages further studies of minor improvement expenditure on residential property.

This paper adds to the body of renovation literature as the data collection was conducted at the time improvements were being made, thus reducing response errors. The inclusion of comprehensive valuation reports by registered valuers increased the reliability of market value assessments. Research in this area is useful to provide greater understanding of the benefits of minor improvement expenditure.

This paper aims to, using a systematic mixed-methods based monitoring and evaluation approach, investigate the unintended consequences of physical and technical home improvements on energy use, indoor environmental conditions and occupant behaviour in community-led retrofits. The study is part of a UK Research Council funded research project on evaluating the impacts and effectiveness of low carbon communities on energy behaviours.

A graduated measurement, monitoring and evaluation framework has been developed and applied to gather quantitative and qualitative data on energy use and behaviours has been developed and applied to 88 households across the UK. A mixed-methods approach is used, including occupant interviews, questionnaires, activity diaries and continuous physical monitoring of energy use, environmental conditions and low-carbon technologies.

The study has uncovered a number of unintended consequences associated with home energy improvements, both beneficial and detrimental, including improved comfort levels in retrofitted dwellings and reduction in energy use but also an increased likelihood of overheating following fabric improvements, potential under-performance of low-carbon systems due to lack of understanding and inadequate installation and commissioning, along with adaptive energy behaviours leading to increased energy use and a widening gap between predicted and actual savings.

Although 63 case study households are involved, it is difficult to provide statistical analysis from the emerging findings.

This paper demonstrates the unintended consequences of home energy improvements. It aims to bring awareness of these issues to various sectors and stakeholders involved in delivering community retrofit programmes or the National Green Deal programme.

The paper fulfils an identified need to study the impacts of home energy improvements within existing homes through a robust, comprehensive M&E approach.

This paper reports on data from two linked studies in the UK and Germany which evaluated the potential of a quality management system, Qual A Sess, to play a role in self‐regulation in care homes for older people in the context of calls for EU‐wide harmonization of standards. Qual A Sess was developed by German and UK organisations to assess the quality of care in care homes and mechanisms to improve the quality of care through the development of action plans involving residents, families and staff in the process. This paper compares the outcomes of Qual A Sess in care homes in both countries, by focusing on the data available about the action plans generated by the Qual A Sess process, and suggests that standardization of quality indicators may be inappropriate in the context of local differences.

The Government's drive to improve the overall health of the population, by tackling health inequalities and measures such as reducing falls and ending fuel poverty, has created a policy framework to address the housing related aspects of health. Opportunities for the NHS and local authorities to work with the voluntary sector to achieve these aims mean that there are new possibilities for wide‐ranging, innovative responses to improving people's health by tackling housing issues.Care & Repair England has undertaken research which examines how home improvement agencies (HIAs) are working with health‐sector partners to bring about health improvement through housing‐related initiatives and services.The resulting report, Healthy Homes, Healthier Lives, brings together key evidence that demonstrates the beneficial impact of improved housing conditions on health and examines the current policy context. A spectrum of joint projects is profiled including schemes providing information and training for health and care sector staff, a range of joint approaches to falls prevention, hospital discharge services and initiatives to address fuel poverty and cold, damp housing.

The purpose of this paper is to outline an approach being taken, to improve opportunities and increase levels of physical activity amongst residents in care homes in Scotland, which has the potential to make a significant difference to the quality of lives. The approach is designed to raise awareness about the importance of physical activity, increase skills, knowledge and capacity amongst the workforce.

The paper describes the reasons for promoting physical activity in care homes. It describes the challenge to this, associated issues and introduces you to a resource pack which offers solutions to care homes through a self-improvement process. It provides a case study which exemplifies how the ideas can be applied on a day-to-day basis.

The paper provides insights into the challenges in the care home sector to promoting physical activity and offers some ways round these. It describes two strategies within the new resource pack to support care home residents to make person centred physical activity choices.

This paper suggests that to promote physical activity in a care home the choices and needs of an individual must be the starting point. It requires partnership working and good leadership where staff have the permission to work in a new way. It suggests that risk enablement is key and the benefits of physical activity outweigh the risks even with frail older people.

This paper promotes a new resource pack for care homes in Scotland for promoting an active life based on a self-improvement process.

This paper aims to outline an exploratory study of how a multi-agency, partnership approach to crime prevention might enable the police more effectively to target their utilisation of resources in order both to reduce local levels of criminality and to improve public confidence. It is set against a backdrop of major police reforms that will require police commanders to demonstrate high levels of accountability in terms of resource and financial utilisation, and to show continuing improvement in levels of public confidence.

A case study approach is adopted; it draws upon both primary and secondary data sources and is framed within a situational approach to crime prevention.

There has been a drop in the levels of burglary in those areas where the home improvement initiative (Decent Homes Programme) has been carried out. The tenants consulted as part of the research reported that they felt safer in their homes as a result. Also, their general level of satisfaction with the police and other agencies has improved.

There has been an overall drop in levels of reported crime in terms of burglaries across the UK. It may be asked whether such improvement in Nottingham has been due to a genuine improvement in police performance or is as a consequence of the home improvements. The present paper is a single case study, with no opportunity for a comparative analysis across other police force areas. This limitation could be overcome by other researchers involved in similar Decent Homes Programmes in other cities in the UK.

The research illustrates that multi-agency working may indeed help create an improvement in living conditions for residents. It also identifies the fact that, as a result of successful integrated multi-agency approaches to crime prevention, the police are able to save resources in terms of time spent investigating crime.

This paper adds tangible evidence to theoretical discourse on the benefits of multi-agency work in the context of social housing

Vacation rental homes, in general, have different energy usage characteristics than traditional residential homes mainly because of the occupancy pattern that changes on a weekly basis. These homes, predominantly larger in size, offer a greater scope for energy savings also because of the wasteful habits of their seasonal occupants. The purpose of this paper is to investigate the causes of energy inefficiencies prevalent in these homes so that appropriate retrofit choices can be offered to homeowners.

This research presents a case study of a vacation rental home whose energy consumption was investigated in depth and energy inefficiencies identified through modeling using energy modeling software, eQUEST. Simulations were performed to identify viable retrofit scenarios.

While improvement in the building envelope such as providing shades/overhangs on the windows, reducing infiltration and increasing insulation of the exterior wall did not show promising results for savings on energy cost, other improvements such as use of highly efficient lamps, tank-less water heater system and occupancy sensors showed viable investment options with shorter payback periods. It was also found that energy use intensity of sampled houses was about half of the average of US residential buildings, which could primarily be attributed to the seasonal nature of occupancy of these houses.

There is a dearth of literature pertaining to energy efficiency-related retrofits of coastal vacation homes. This research fills that gap to some extent by addressing this issue with an ultimate aim of assisting homeowners in retrofit decision-making.

This paper aims to maintain the high service quality of the long-term care service providers by establishing a knowledge-based system so as to enhance the service quality of nursing homes and the performance of its nursing staff continually.

An intelligent case-based knowledge management system (ICKMS) is developed with the integration of two artificial intelligence techniques, i.e. fuzzy logic and case-based reasoning (CBR). In the system, fuzzy logic is adopted to assess the performance through the analysis of the long-term care services provided, nurse performance and elderly satisfaction, whereas CBR is used to formulate a customized re-training program for quality improvement. A case study is conducted to validate the feasibility of the proposed system.

The empirical findings indicate that the ICKMS helps in identification of those nursing staff who cannot meet the essential service standard. Through the customized re-training program, the performance of the nursing staff can be greatly enhanced, whereas the medical errors and complaints can be considerably reduced. Furthermore, the proposed methodology provides a cost-saving approach in the administrative work.

The findings and results of the study facilitate decision-making using the ICKMS for the long-term service providers to improve their performance and service quality by providing a customized re-training program to the nursing staff.

This study contributes to establishing a knowledge-based system for the long-term service providers for maintaining the high service quality in the health-care industry.

More than two million older home owners have housing assets worth over £50,000, but incomes so low that they qualify for means‐tested benefits. Drawing on housing equity could improve their quality of life significantly, helping them to live more comfortably in their own homes for longer. But only about 25,000 home owners (of all ages and incomes) conclude equity release deals each year. This paper identifies the obstacles that deter asset‐rich, income‐poor older home owners from drawing on their housing equity, and suggests ways of overcoming them. The focus is on paying for additional care at home, home improvements and repairs.

The vast majority of older people (90%) live in the general housing stock and 70% are owneroccupiers. One of the major challenges for planners in the housing, health and social care sectors is the development of a coherent joint strategy which enables older people to live independently in their own homes. Home improvement agencies (HIAs) aim to meet the housing and related support needs of mainly older home‐owners. Research carried out by Care and Repair England has been tracking and studying the diversification of HIAs into services areas which ‘cross the housing and care divide’. The results of this work have recently been published. They demonstrate both the range and the extent of new service provision by HIAs and its value both to older people wishing to ‘stay put’ and to planners charged with implementing cross‐sector work and prevention strategies.