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The purpose of this study is to examine the effects of market-based approach to provision of housing to low-income households in urban Malawi.

This study was conducted in Blantyre, Malawi, between 2019 and 2022 and used both quantitative (household survey) and qualitative (in-depth interviews and document study) methods of data collection. Interviews were conducted with key players and investors in the housing sector. Household survey data were analyzed through descriptive statistics, which allowed the generation of descriptive housing valuables, whereas qualitative data were analyzed through content analysis.

This paper demonstrates that, rather than ameliorating the housing problems facing low-income households, the market approach to provision of housing in Malawi has worsened the housing situation in the country. This is so because the market approach to the provision of housing in Malawi is not only enforcing the logic of capitalistic accumulation in the housing sector but also supporting mechanisms of exclusion based on economic stratification within the community.

Completeness of data over time as there is no market data bank available in the country.

The findings from this study suggest that some degree of state intervention in addressing the housing problem in Malawi is required.

The study findings suggest that a market approach to the provision of housing can increase social inequality as low-income households face challenges in accessing housing.

There is a paucity of research on the effects of the market approach on the provision of affordable housing to low-income households in Malawi. This paper assesses this important policy gap and provides significant policy directions.

As public–private partnerships (PPPs) have become preferred and veritable approach to deliver affordable housing, the seemingly lack of understanding of the significant factors that impact on success has become a notable setback. This study aims to delineate significant factors that can support decisions in affordable PPP public housing delivery.

Largely, a questionnaire survey was adopted to elicit insights from practitioners, policymakers and experts to develop an evaluative decision support model using an analytical hierarchy process and multi-attribute utility technique approach. Further, an expert illustration was conducted to evaluate and validate the results on the housing typologies.

The results revealed that energy efficiency and low-cost green building materials scored the highest weighting of all the criteria. Furthermore, multi-storey self-contained flats were found to be the most preferred housing typology and were significantly influenced by these factors. From the model evaluation, the scores on the factors of sustainability, affordability, cultural values and accountability were consistent across all typologies of housing whereas that of benchmarking, governance and transparency were varied.

The decision support factors captured varied dimensions of key factors that impact on affordable PPP housing that have not been considered in an integrated manner. These findings offer objective and systematic support to decision-making in affordable PPP housing delivery.

This paper aims to help understand how adopting risk allocation criteria impacts the delivery of public–private partnership (PPP) mass housing in Nigeria with the view of promoting the adoption of PPP housing scheme in Nigeria.

The research design adopts the census sampling approach by using well-structured questionnaires distributed to stakeholders involved in PPP-procured mass housing projects, i.e. consultants, in-house professionals, contractors and the organized private sector, registered with PPP departments in the Federal Capital Territory Development Authority, Abuja, Nigeria. Sixty-three risk factors, nine risk allocation criteria and nine project delivery indices were submitted for the respondents to rank on a Likert scale of 7. Two hypotheses were formulated to test whether the risk allocation criteria impacted PPP mass housing delivery or otherwise. The study adopts partial least square-structural equation modeling to model the effect of risk on risk allocation criteria on project delivery indices and risk severity.

The finding shows that project risk allocation criteria have less effect on project delivery indices than on risk severity. The study concludes that risk allocation principles do not directly affect the delivery of PPP-procured mass housing projects. This is evident by the path coefficient of 0.724 values, which is not statistically significant at a 5% alpha protection value. The study concludes that allocating critical risk factors influences the performance of PPP-procured mass housing projects, as the path coefficient of 0.360 is also not significantly far from 0 and at a 5% alpha protection value.

The study is one of the recent studies conducted in PPP-procured mass housing projects in Nigeria owing to the novelty of procurement option in the sector. It highlights the risk factors that can jeopardize the PPP-procured mass housing project objectives. The study is of immense value to PPP actors in the sector by providing the necessary information required to formulate risk response methods to minimize the impact of the risk factors in PPP mass housing projects.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the effects of financialisation on the changing structure of housing supply in Malaysia. The share of newly launched sub-MYR250,000 houses has been decreasing continuously in the past decade. This implies that housing developers are launching more expensive houses. The greater focus on higher cost housing could be attributed to inflation. But while input cost is rising, the housing sector has also become increasingly financialised. This claim can be supported by the rising share of mortgage and real estate loans in gross domestic product. Financialisation is a process in which the financial sector becomes more dominant relative to the real sector. The extent to which this process is responsible for the changing structure of housing supply in Malaysia is investigated.

A survey of the literature suggested that the decreasing the proportion of newly launched sub-MYR250,000 housing could be result of rising input cost, greater degree of financialisation and changing market concentration. Thus, long-run cointegrating equations were formulated and estimated. These equations linked housing share with financialisation, market structure and input cost. The quantitative and qualitative impact of financialisation on the structure of housing supply is of interest.

The analyses of secondary data suggested that financialisation and input cost did indeed contribute to the decrease in proportion of newly launched sub-MYR250,000 housing. However, the impact of market concentration on housing share was ambiguous. This conclusion survived several robustness checks.

The financialisation of the housing sector implies that developers are increasingly building for profits instead of accommodating the social objective of providing shelter. This result is unsettling because access to adequate housing is a human right. The transformation of housing from the concept of a shelter to a tradable, money-making asset could be a major contributor to the declining housing affordability in the country. Thus, efforts to improve affordability must take account of the effects of financialisation.

An empirical framework for assessing the changes in the structure of housing supply was developed. Existing studies tended to focus only on the volume of housing supply. It is a comprehensive study on changes in the structure of housing supply. Second, while existing studies on the financialisation of housing are mostly qualitative in methodology, this paper offers a quantitative assessment of the financialisation in the housing sector.

The purpose of this study is to use a lifetime income measure to evaluate the long-run housing affordability for an understudied cohort of households in the literature – the millennials. The authors do this in the context of Malaysia, measuring long-run affordability for four housing types across geographic locations and income distributions.

This study calculates a long-run housing affordability index (HAI) using data on house prices and household incomes. Essentially a ratio of predicted lifetime incomes to house prices, the HAI is computed for four common housing types in Malaysia from 2005 to 2016 and for six states in the country. The HAI is also compared across four income percentiles.

The analysis reveals varying patterns of housing affordability among different states in Malaysia. Housing affordability has declined since 2010, with most housing types being unaffordable for millennial-led households with the lowest income. Housing is most affordable for those in the highest income bracket, although even here, there are pockets of unaffordable housing as well.

Based on the findings, this study proposes three targeted interventions to improve housing affordability for Malaysian millennials.

This study fills a gap in the literature by examining the long-run housing affordability of Malaysian millennial-led households based on both geographic location and income distribution. The millennial population is understudied in the housing affordability literature, making this study a valuable contribution to the field.

The Recast Energy Efficiency Directive 2023 has defined the concept of “split incentive,” also known as “tenant-owner dilemma.” This dilemma refers to the situation where neither landlords nor tenants have incentives to invest in energy efficiency upgrades. Although the Energy Efficiency Directive calls Member States to overcome legal barriers to remove split incentives and to encourage retrofits, the list of possible measures is too vague. This paper aims to discuss tenancy law measures designed to increase the energy efficiency of residential housing and to detect which Member States have already addressed this phenomenon.

This paper analyses, from a civil legal perspective, the possible private law barriers arising from the tenant-owner dilemma when performing energy efficiency works in selected countries and proposes legal reforms in tenancy law and related policies to overcome them. To do so, this paper follows a legal-dogmatic and comparative law methodology.

This paper concludes that some tenancy law provisions, such as the possibility to increase the rent after energy efficiency renovations and long-term leases, may challenge the tenant-owner dilemma in private rented markets, thus promoting renovations and retrofitting for energy efficiency purposes. It also proposes other policies intended to increase parties’ willingness to undertake works.

More research on the economic and legal efficiency to regulate some of the civil law measures to challenge the tenant-owner dilemma should be necessary.

The civil law measures included in this paper may help national policymakers meet the energy efficiency targets, according to what is established in the Recast Energy Efficiency Directive 2023.

Based on the economic theory of the tenant-owner dilemma, this paper investigates the elements of tenancy law that may contribute to less energy-efficient homes, proposing policies for those countries interested in addressing the energy-efficiency challenge from a private law point of view.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate how the pandemic affects tenants’ response to their lease obligations. This paper commences with examining the adopted tenant selection criteria during the COVID-19 pandemic. Then, this paper statistically tests if there is a relationship between selection criteria and response on whether the pandemic has effects or not. Then, this paper investigates the specific areas of impact on tenants’ ability to adequately keep to lease agreements in the Nigerian rental market. Finally, this paper proceeds to confirm if there is a relationship between selection criteria and the aspects of tenants’ deficiencies in rental obligations because of COVID-19.

Survey data, backed with interviews, is elicited from practicing estate surveyors and valuers and licensed property managers in Lagos, the largest property market in Nigeria and sub-Sahara Africa. Policy solutions and implications were solicited from personnel at the ministry of housing and senior professionals in the property sector. Data were analyzed using descriptive statistics, factor analysis and computer-aided qualitative data analysis, Atlas.ti.

Tenant’s health status is now accorded a priority together with others. Numbers of tenants are challenged with keeping to the prompt-rent-payment rule. Other areas of slight breaches included livestock rearing, subletting, alteration and repair covenants. Except for tenant reputation and tenant family size, there was no significant relationship between tenant’s health status consideration and the COVID-19 effect on tenant non-compliance with lease obligation. Tenants’ non-compliance with tenancy obligations has a connection with the tenants’ affordability, reputation, ability to sign an undertaking and health conditions during the pandemic. This paper recommends rental housing policy review.

It is recommended that the rental policy should be reviewed to give room for rental allowance or palliatives, private rental market regulation, exploration of the national housing fund and, if possible, social housing adoption policy in Nigeria.

This paper draws policymakers’ attention to the need to prepare for the future safety net that caters to citizenry welfare in challenging times.

The housing policies targeting low-income households have not been effective to address the housing needs of target groups in Iran over the past four decades. According to the World Bank’s data on population living in slums (% of urban population) in Iran in 2018 was 25% which is slightly higher than the rate 23% of upper-middle-income countries. This study aims to understand what major revisions are required in the process of housing policymaking to have more effective policies.

The authors conduct one-to-one interviews with 41 housing experts and apply discourse analysis and interpretive–structural modeling to achieve the goals.

The panel of experts argue that the success of housing policies in Iran depends on the following: all academic disciplines should be included in the process of housing policymaking process; land policymaking should be modified; housing policy is a regional issue, and it should be designed and implemented differently in each province; main modifications are required in the tax and tenancy system; and new policies are required to push vacant houses into the rental market.

This study is a prescriptive study based on a general trend (four decades).

Between 2006 and 2012, Mexico implemented a “frontal war against organized crime”. This strategy increased criminal violence and triggered negative consequences across the country’s economic, political and social spheres. This study aims to analyse how the magnitude and visibility of criminal violence impact the housing market of Mexico City.

The authors used different violent proxies to measure the effect of the magnitude and visibility of violence in housing prices. The structure of the data set is an unbalanced panel with no conditions of strict exogeneity. To address endogeneity, the authors calculate the first differences to estimate an Arellano–Bond estimator and use the lags of the dependent variable to instrumentalise the endogenous variable.

Results suggest that the magnitude of violence negatively impacts housing prices. Similarly, housing prices are negatively affected the closer the property is to visible violence, measured through narcomessages placed next to the bodies of executed victims. Lastly, housing prices are not always affected when a violent event occurs nearby, specifically, when neighbours or potential buyers consider this event as sporadic violence.

There are only a few studies of violence in housing prices using data from developing countries, and most of these studies are conducted with aggregated data at the municipality or state level. The authors are using geocoded information, both violence events and housing prices, to estimate more disaggregated effects. Moreover, the authors used different proxies to measure different characteristics of violence (magnitude and visibility) to estimate the heterogeneous effects of violence on housing prices.

Previous studies on housing affordability in China were concentrated in China’s coastal and central regions. The purpose of this paper is to investigate housing affordability of urban residents in Northwest China. Moreover, this paper attempts to understand the consistency and influencing factors of various indicators on the evaluation of housing affordability.

This paper uses multiyear data on house sales, residents’ incomes and living expenses from 2011 to 2022. House price-to-income ratio, housing affordability index and residual income approach were calculated by using these data and used as the measure of housing affordability.

The results show that there are obvious differences in the housing affordability among the Xi’an, Lanzhou and Yinchuan during 2011–2022, and the housing affordability of residents in cities with small population and economic scale is better. The ability of most urban residents to afford suitable housing is still poor, and the ability to afford small-sized housing is better. Most families with below-middle income have poor housing affordability. It is also observed that although various indicators had similarities in the evaluation of residents’ housing affordability, the comprehensive evaluation results of multiple indicators were more reliable.

The research results provide a basis for the decision-making of the government’s urban housing policy and improvement of residents’ housing conditions.

The results have a clear understanding of the housing affordability of urban residents in Northwest China. The study found that the geographical location and topography of the city is also a factor affecting the housing affordability.